


Far From Home

by dracusfyre



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, BAMF Bucky Barnes, BAMF Tony Stark, Crusades, Fake/Pretend Relationship, M/M, Swordplay, Tumblr Prompt, but also the regular kind, if you know what i mean, wink wink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-09-29 00:01:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 25,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17192693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dracusfyre/pseuds/dracusfyre
Summary: Welcome to my trope mash-up, Medieval AU + Fake Dating, based on an anonymous request from Tumblr.  Bucky, fleeing from the sinister organization of assassins known as Hydra, agrees to help kidnapped nobleman Tony get back to his home.  Unfortunately, it turns out that fleeing the Holy Land while hiding from both Hydra and the Ten Rings was the easy part...





	1. Fancy Meeting You Here

                Bucky put his head down and concentrated on his breathing and the rocky ground beneath his feet; one wrong step on the uncertain gravel and he’d be lost, recaptured by his pursuers.  Because of the twists and turns of the wadi he was in, he couldn’t hear them behind him, but he knew they were close.  They were also on horseback, which was his only advantage right now; the uneven ground of the dry river bed would slow them down and, if Bucky were lucky, give him enough time to find a place to hide.  This part of the country was a maze of dry creek beds, awaiting the rainy season to fill up and temporarily turn this sunburnt, acrid region into a veritable Eden.   It would take Hydra weeks to systematically search them all.

                The risk, of course, was that Bucky would himself get lost in the maze and die unpleasantly of thirst and exposure, but he’d far prefer that than getting dragged back to the Old Man of the Mountain in chains for another round of “re-education.”

                A shadow in the wall of the wadi caught Bucky’s eye and he changed course to investigate.  Hidden from the main course of the canyon was a smaller river bed; following it up, scrambling over boulders and water-polished gravel, he traced his way to the irrigation channels of an abandoned farm, weedy and marked by stunted, twisted olive trees.  The collapsing farmhouse was too obvious a hiding spot so he searched instead for the well that was likely somewhere on the property.  He found it in a far corner, haphazardly boarded over, and with a prayer he slipped between the boards into the dark shadow of the well.  Bracing his back against one wall and his feet on the other, he slowly and carefully made his way down, wondering just a little too late if there was going to be water at the bottom.

                But it ended up dry, which was probably why the farm was abandoned.  To his surprise, though, when Bucky dropped the last few feet to the bottom of the well he fell backwards when the ground moved under his feet.

                “What the hell?” Bucky said, drawing his dagger as the darkness at the bottom of the well moved and became a lump, then a head and a face appeared.

                “Who the hell are you?” The face hissed in French.  “What are you doing here?”

                “Uh, hiding?” Bucky answered in French as well, rusty though it was after years of speaking Arabic.  "Who the hell are you?"

                “You can’t hide here, I’m hiding here! Get your own spot."

                As Bucky’s eyes grew used to the darkness he realized that the man had been hiding under a dark blanket to conceal his pale skin from anyone looking into the well.  “There’s room for us both,” he said.  He looked up at the narrow sliver of sky visible from the top of the well.  It would take far too long to climb back up, he would lose every minute of the lead he'd gained.  “Please.”

                “Ok, fine, get under here.”  The man gestured and threw the blanket over both of them.  It was hot and humid and smelled of sweat and dirt, but Bucky was grateful for it all the same, though it would provide scant protection if anyone decided to fire down into the well.

                “Who are you hiding from?” Bucky said, voice so low it was almost inaudible.  Every sense was strained for the sound of voices or horses, but so far the only sounds were birds calling to each other far in the distance.

                “The Ten Rings,” the man said just as quietly.  In the darkness, Bucky made a face.  Sometimes rivals and sometimes allies of Hydra, the Ten Rings were a nasty bunch of jackals drawn from the dregs of every invading force that had thought to own the Holy Land.  This man must have been lucky or skilled to escape.  “You?”

                “Hydra.” Bucky slid his hand under his clothes and pulled out a flask of precious water.  He took just enough of a sip to wet his mouth, dry from running, then he held it out in the direction of the voice.  “Water?”

                “God yes,” the man said, fumbling in the dark before he found Bucky’s hand. “Thank you.”  Bucky winced as he heard the man take a large swallow, but he had no idea how long he’d been hiding here nor how far he had fled before he’d found the farm so he bit his tongue as the man handed the flask back. 

                They both fell silent for a while, listening to the world go by the dubious safety of their hiding spot, until Bucky could tell that the sun was starting to set.   “Were you going to stay here all night, too?” Bucky asked, risking a glance outside the blanket. Sure enough, the sky was starting to darken.

                “No.”  The man pulled off the blanket and peered upwards.  "To be honest, I didn't really plan this far." It was still light enough that Bucky could finally get a good look at the man he’d been hiding with for hours; he definitely had the look of a captive, hollow cheeks and unkempt hair.  Despite that, Bucky could tell that under the scraggly beard the man was not an unhandsome one. “I’m trying to make my way to Acre, how about you?”

                “Anywhere, as long as it’s away.” Bucky tested the walls of the well, wondering if there was an easier way to climb up than the way he’d climbed down.  “How were you going to get out of here?” Bucky asked.  Underneath the man's baggy, ill-fitting clothes Bucky could tell that he was shorter and slimmer than Bucky himself so there was no way he could have climbed down the same way Bucky did.

                Sure enough, the man produced a pair of thin metal rods, thicker than a hoof pick but thinner than a chisel. With a little bit of effort, he was able to drive one of them into the dry and cracking plaster between the stones of the well.  “It’s going to be hard, but easier than trying to climb up like a spider.”

                “If you trust me, I will go first,” Bucky said, holding a hand out for the picks.  “I can make the holes, and then you can climb up behind me.”

                For a long moment the man was silent, eyeing Bucky warily.  From what Bucky could tell, the picks were made of solid pig iron, which while it wasn’t gold or silver, it was still a valuable trading commodity now that every scrap of iron, good or not, was needed for weapons for the Holy War.  Eventually, though, the man handed them over.  “I’ll wait for you at the top and give them back,” Bucky promised, and he slowly made his way up, using the picks to chisel out hand- and foot-holds all the way up.  When he got near the lip of the well he paused, even though his arms and legs were burning, and searched carefully for signs of people.  Though the sun was already past the edge of the horizon, Bucky could tell that the farm was still deserted.  “All clear,” he called back down, and after a few minutes the man’s head popped out of the top of the well.

                “Thank God,” the man said, taking a deep breath and stretching his limbs, turning his face to the sky as if it were something he hadn’t seen in a long while.  The North Star was already out, shining serenely in the rosy sky, and the moon was low and fat at the edge of the horizon.  “By the way, my name is Antoine,” the man said, holding his hand out. 

                “Iacobus, but call me Bucky,” he said, shaking it and handing the picks back over.  “Thank you,” he added. “For helping me.”

                “Yeah, about that,” Antoine said, hugging his arms around himself; as the sun went down, the air had grown noticeably chillier. “If you’re not heading in any particular direction, how do you feel about helping me get to Acre? I mean, two heads are better than one, right? Maybe people will pay less attention to us if we travel together instead of apart.”

                “Um…” Bucky tried to think of a polite way to say, “I don’t think you’ll be able to keep up with me,” because even if the man had been in good shape prior to his captivity, months of being held by the Ten Rings had undoubtedly taken a toll on him physically.  Meanwhile, Bucky was at the peak of his training, able to jog for miles in the heat of the day without faltering and go days without food or sleep.  On the other hand, the man had a point; fighters who traveled by themselves were treated with suspicion and mistrust and frequently driven out of towns at the first sign of trouble.

                “I can pay you,” the man added when Bucky's hesitation grew telling.  “I know it doesn’t look like it right now, but if you can get me to the Knights Templar station near Acre, I’ll be able to pay you, I promise.”

                At the mention of the Knights Templar, everything started to make more sense.  “The Ten Rings were holding you for ransom,” Bucky said with dawning realization.  That explained why a man like this, with his good, even teeth and flawless French, was being held by an organization like the Ten Rings.

                “Yes.  I mean, they were also making me work for them, but I am pretty sure they kidnapped me for ransom.”  That explained the callouses on the man's hands, which were certainly not something a fancy, ransom-worthy French noblemen would have. Bucky wondered what kind of work they'd had him doing. 

                “Yes, I’ll help you,” Bucky decided.  Taking another look at the North Star, he turned and started walking. "Acre is this way," he said over his shoulder. "But we should reach the closest town by daybreak, even if we have to take a rest."

                Antoine jogged a little to catch up. "You haven't said how much you want in return for your aide."

                "Depends on who finds us first, Hydra or the Ten Rings," Bucky said dryly. "I'll tell you what: if either of us get killed on the way to Acre, I'll give you a 100 percent discount."


	2. Oh No, Only One Bed

               “Wish we had a horse,” Antoine said wistfully.  Bucky only grunted, trying to keep his senses alert for an ambush or signs of pursuit. “This would go a lot faster with a horse,” he added.  “I don’t suppose we can get one?”

               “Even if we could afford it, which we _can’t_ ,” Bucky said, which was a bit of a lie; they could probably buy one with the money Bucky had managed to bring with him when he fled, but at the prices a good horse commanded these days, that would be the _only_ thing they could buy.  “Then we’d have to feed it.”  He gestured around them, at the dry, scrubby grass and dried up creek beds.  “So far we haven’t even been able to feed ourselves.”

               “True.”  Bucky had blessed silence for a few minutes, and he made a bet with himself whether Antoine was going to ask about food or how much longer they would be walking.

               “So who or what is Hydra?” Antoine asked instead and Bucky stopped so suddenly that Antoine almost ran into him.

               He turned to stare at Antoine in disbelief.  Sure, Hydra was _supposed_ to be a secret organization of assassins, but they were the worst kept secret in the Levant - because how could someone fear them if no one had never heard of them? “Assassins,” Bucky said shortly, when he realized that Antoine really didn't know. He started walking again and focused his attention back to their surroundings.  They were bypassing the roads to avoid running into their pursuit, even though they were making worse time because of it, having to pick their way carefully across the uneven terrain.

               “So were you kidnapped too?”

               “No.”

               “Spying on them?”

               “No.”

               “Then what-”

               “So how exactly did you escape the Ten Rings?” Bucky asked, desperate to change the subject.  Surely, as much as Antoine loved to talk, he would be overjoyed to talk about himself.

               There was a brief, thoughtful pause and then Antoine said, “Sabotage, mostly.” When Bucky made an interested noise he said, “Well, they were holding me in a series of underground caverns, so I made my picks, unlocked the shackles they had me in, and sapped part of the support structure for the caves.”

               Bucky blinked and looked at Antoine with new respect.  “So when you ran, you collapsed their caves behind you?”

               “Yes.”

               Bucky pondered that for a while as they walked, but the more he thought about it the more something didn’t seem to add up.  “How did you know how to do that?” He asked finally. Sapping was a technique of advanced siege warfare; a nobleman, upon deciding to participate in the Crusade, might know that sapping as a technique existed, but it beggared belief that he would know how to do it without killing himself in the process.

               “Well, just before my caravan was ambushed by the Ten Rings, I was reading Avicenna’s _The Book of Healing,_ particularly the chapters on geography-”

               “Ibn Sina,” Bucky corrected absently.  That was true, Ibn Sina did discuss the science of the earth in that book, but it was still impressive that Antoine could put those theoretical principles to practical use.

               “I’m sorry?” Antoine said with a funny note in his voice.

               “His name is Abu Ali Ibn Sina,” Bucky clarified.  “Avicenna is a Crusader bastardization of his name.”

               “Right,” Antoine said slowly, and when Bucky looked over he saw Antoine staring at him with wide eyes.

               “What?”

               “You’ve heard of Avi- Ibn Sina,” Antoine said, sounding awed. “Have you read his books?”

                Bucky frowned at the implication that he was uneducated.  “Yes, of course.”  For all of his many, many other sins, the Man of the Mountain did insist that his agents were well read on many subjects, if only to make them more effective at their work.

               "'Of course,' he says." Antoine made a strangled noise of excitement and jogged ahead so he could turn to face Bucky, walking backwards.  “Tell me, what did you think of his idea of the Floating Man?”

               Bucky groaned as Antoine started talking twice as much.  Just his luck to have run across a natural philosopher, they were almost as bad as pilgrims for being impossible to shut up. “You know, we are trying to _hide_ ,” he gritted out, and to his credit, Antoine shut up immediately, though his rebuked silence and the way he was staring at his feet eventually made Bucky feel guilty.  “It’s an interesting thought experiment,” Bucky sighed, giving in.  “And the fact that men can walk and talk in their sleep and have no memory of it upon wake does seem to argue for his premise that the body and the consciousness are two separate entities.”

               “But it’s the _relationship_ between the body and mind that are the most interesting…”

               Despite himself, he was drawn into the conversation with Antoine, who was possessed of a lively and clever intellect.  It made the time and miles pass much more quickly, and as the sky started to lighten, they began to see the signs that they had passed out of the wilds and were back in civilized lands. The scrubby, unkempt landscape became neat and orderly, marked with boundary walls and well-cared for buildings. Eventually Bucky judged that it was safe enough to be on the roads; this close to a city, even Hydra and the Ten Rings would be wary of moving against them openly.  To their fortune, the town they were approaching seemed to be having a market day, judging from the steady stream of farmers and merchants passing them on the road.  Most of them passed by them quickly, but Bucky realized that one set of hooves had been behind them for a while.  Glancing warily over his shoulder, he tugged Antoine to the side to take a look at the wagon on the road behind them.  Instead of riding, the driver was leading the horse, a shaggy brown looking thing that was clearly limping on his back hoof. 

               Before Bucky could stop him, Antoine was waving the wagon down and jogging up to them.  “Hey, I can take a look at your horse for you, if you like,” he said in passable, if accented, Arabic.  He pointed to the horse’s back hoof. “It’s going to lose it’s, um,” he glanced at Bucky and said in French, “How do you say horseshoe in Arabic?”

               Bucky started to answer but the man was already shrugging and saying “Yes, please, if you can.”    

               With a reassuring smile, Antoine went to the horse’s head, holding his hand out for the beast to snuffle; Bucky winced, waiting for it to bite.  But this one was apparently feeling generous today because after a minute it allowed Antoine to stroke its forehead and neck, one ear turned to listen to Antoine’s steady stream of soothing patter.  Bucky watched as he stroked gentle hands over the animal’s hide, getting it used to him as he gradually made his way to the hind leg that it had been limping on, which was currently cocked against the ground.  Antoine’s movements were mesmerizing, rhythmic and steady, hands confident and eyes soft as he soothed the horse enough for it to let him lift its hoof.  For a split second Bucky imagined being touched like that, gentle and warm, touches meant to bring comfort and not pain-

               “What brings you to Assayidat?” The farmer asked, startling Bucky out of his thoughts. He ran a hand over his face and turned his attention away from Antoine and back to their surroundings, looking for anyone that might be paying too much attention to them. 

              “We are on our way to Acre,” Antoine said over his shoulder.  He had produced one of his picks but hunched as he was over the horse’s leg, Bucky couldn’t see what he was doing. “He’s my b-“

               “Bridegroom,” Bucky jumped in when he realized what Antoine was going to say.  “Soon, that is,” he added, hoping Antoine was clever enough to play along.  “We are affianced.”  

               “Congratulations,” the farmer said dubiously, and Bucky realized that the man was noticing the extremely difference in their clothing; Bucky was wearing dark leather and linen and had well well-oiled boots and a neatly trimmed beard.  Antoine, on the other hand, was wearing rags and had clearly not had his hair or beard trimmed in quite a while; for the first time, Bucky also noticed that his shoes were just strips of leather with rags tying them to his feet, and he felt bad for the brisk pace he’d set all night.

               He took a step closer to Antoine and plastered a smile on his face.  “My dear fiancé here is doing penance,” he said, and the man’s expression cleared. Pilgrims were common enough here that most strange behaviors could be explained by religious fervor.

               “May Allah forgive you your sins,” the farmer said, bowing his head and touching his forehead piously.

               “He’s dedicated himself to doing good work in hope of alms,” Bucky continued, ignoring the frown Antoine threw his way.  “He refuses to take food or goods that he hasn’t earned, even though I told him we have coin enough to support ourselves.”  He smiled fondly at Antoine, who was starting to look more and more confused.  “Isn’t that right?”

               “Um…yes?” Antoine put the horse’s hoof down and patted him on the haunches. “His…sandal,” Tony said, gesturing to the hoof, “wasn’t loose, there was a rock.”

               The farmer brightened and led his horse in a small circle, grinning broadly when the limp vanished as the horse realized the pain in its foot was gone.  It shook its head, bridle and harness jangling. “Many thanks,” he said.  “What can I do to show my gratitude?”

               Antoine glanced at Bucky for guidance, and Bucky kept his face open and friendly while praying that Antoine wouldn’t screw this up.  After a moment, Antoine put a hand on his chest and bowed, his aristocratic upbringing showing through despite the hair and clothes. “Whatever you can spare, good sir,” he said formally, and Bucky relaxed.

               “The least I can do is give you a ride,” he said, gesturing to the wagon.  When they had climbed in, settling in among the sheaves of barley and stalks of lentils, he passed them a clay pot and some flat bread.  “It is harvest time for chickpeas,” he explained, clucking to the horse and flicking the reins to get them back on the road.  “I cannot eat another chickpea.”

               “Thank you,” Bucky said with fervent gratefulness, opening the lid to the pot and handing a little more than half of the bread to Antoine.  “My compliments and gratitude to the cook.”

               It was a short ride into town and when they had finished eating Bucky could tell that Antoine was reaching the end of his stamina; frankly Bucky was surprised he lasted this long.  While he dozed, Bucky leaned forward to the farmer and asked quietly, “Is there someone in town who would accept a pair of travelers?”

               “Certainly.  I will direct you to them when we reach the market.”

               The boarding house was just a short walk from the center of town where the market was; Bucky managed to get Antoine out of the wagon and back on his feet, though judging from Antoine’s grimace he was going to be very sore on the morrow.

               “So.  Bridegroom, eh?” Antoine said when they were out of earshot of the helpful farmer.  “So am I to understand we are traveling incognito, that makes sense.  But tell me, why am I doing penance again?”

               “Anticipating our marriage vows,” Bucky said and smothered a grin when Antoine missed a step.

               “But why am _I_ doing penance and not you, too?”

               “Because I don’t feel guilty about it.”

               Antoine laughed. “You’re a saucy wench, aren’t you? I like that in a man. Well, my dear, I guess if we are to be married you should call me Tony.”

               “Toony.” Bucky tried out the foreign sounding word.

               “Tony.”

               “Toony.”

               “T-OH-ny.”

               "Tohny," Bucky repeated obediently.

              "Close enough," Antoine said with amusement, smiling over at Bucky.  The look in Antoine’s – _Tony’s_ – warm brown eyes, fringed with thick, doe-like lashes, made a warm feeling press curl up under Bucky’s breastbone.  Feeling strangely breathless, he glanced away and reminded himself that Tony was just a job, a means to an end.  If they reached Acre they would never see each other again.

               “This is it,” he said, stopping in front of a door flanked by two lemon trees, just as the farmer said.  The door opened almost before he could knock on it and an old lady, hair grey under her head scarf, waved them inside once Bucky told her what they needed.  Bucky passed her a few copper coins stamped with Emperor Justinian’s face and she led them to a room at the back of the house.

               “There’s only one bed,” Tony said in surprise, stopping just inside the door.

               “Of course,” Bucky said, pushing around Tony to get into the room.  Curtains across the windows dimmed the morning light, and two other travelers were already – or still – fast asleep on the straw-filled mattress. “What else did you expect?”  Tony opened his mouth and closed it again, and Bucky could see the tips of his ears turning red.  "Let me guess,  you have your own bed back home?"

               Tony didn't answer as he sat down on the mattress and scooted to the side to give Bucky room to lay down, carefully avoiding the other travelers.  Bucky lay down next to him with a relieved sigh, moving a little when a piece of straw poked him in the back of his neck, and tried to relax.  As silence settled in the room, though, he slowly realized that something was wrong. He opened one eye and saw that Tony was holding himself stiffly, _too_ stiffly, and his jaw was clenched so tight the tendons in his neck were standing out.  His breathing was fast and shallow and there was a crease in his forehead. 

               "Hey," Bucky said quietly and nudged Tony gently with his elbow. "Are you alright?" What's wrong?"

               "I'm fine," he said, sounding very far from fine.  Bucky frowned at him for a moment and then realization dawned.  This was Tony's first time first time sleeping since his escape, he likely didn't feel safe surrounded by strangers. "Switch places with me," he whispered, and Tony's eyes flew open, looking confused.  But he moved over as Bucky shifted to sit between him and the strangers.  "I'll keep watch," he said, sitting up to lean against the wall.  "I'll make sure you're safe."  Tony nodded jerkily as he lay back down, avoiding Bucky's eyes.  He curled up into a tight ball and rested his back against Bucky's thigh; after a moment, he let out a long sigh and his body finally relaxed.  Bucky thought he might have heard a soft _thank you_ so he lay a hand on Tony's shoulder, squeezing it in reassurance, and settled in for first watch.                


	3. Oh No, Only One Horse

               Tony woke suddenly with a start, heart pounding as he sat up and didn’t recognize where he was.  A hand on his back made him jump and then someone was saying, “It’s alright Tony, you’re safe,” in gentle, soothing tones.

               He stared at the man for a second before his mind caught up with his surroundings. “Bucky,” he exhaled, and relaxed back into the stiff, itchy mattress.  He had no idea how long he’d slept, but it was still daylight outside so it couldn’t have been for that long.   He ran a hand over his face, realizing that he felt much better, his thoughts clearer and sharper than they had been before.  He rubbed his eyes and sat up again.  “You didn’t sleep,” he said with surprise.

               “Of course not. I said I would keep watch,” Bucky pointed out. 

               “Well yeah, but…” _not many people keep their promises,_ he thought, and shook his head.  Bucky expected to be paid for keeping his promises, he reminded himself.  It didn’t mean anything.  “Never mind.  It’s my turn, then? So you can sleep?”

               But Bucky was shaking his head and climbing off the mattress; that was when Tony noticed that the other two travelers had left sometime while he was asleep.  “I will sleep later.  Otherwise we will miss the market, and we need supplies.  At the very least, you need new clothes and shoes.”

               “Yes, please,” Tony said, wrinkling his nose. “And a bath.”

               Bucky explained to their host that they would be back later, and Tony caught something about dinner and more pennies changed hands.  The position of the sun in the sky and the fact that the market was still going strong said it was only a little after noon.  Since he had no money, he let Bucky do the bargaining, keeping a careful tally of how much Bucky spent so he could pay him back when he had access to his own funds.  Soon enough Tony had an armful of new – well, new to him – clothing, clean and well-stitched and soft from repeated washings, and Bucky got directions for the well so that Tony could clean up a little.  With a sigh, he eyed the bucket of cold water as he stripped off his shirt, thinking wistfully of his bath at home, big enough to soak in, and the servants who would warm the water for him.         

               Bucky tried not to stare as Tony dipped a rag in the well bucket and began washing the dirt and sweat from his arms and torso, droplets of water beading on his dusky skin as he let the midday sun dry him off.  He was pale from his imprisonment, but Bucky could tell that he had the olive skin of a man from the Mediterranean to go with his dark hair and eyes.  The signs of his time with the Ten Rings were all over his body; scarred welt marks on his back and raw spots on his wrists, the hollows under his ribs and in his cheeks.  But he had lean, corded muscles on his shoulders and back, speaking to time spent with hard labor, with none of the softness Bucky always associated with the nobility.  When he was done, he leaned over and poured the remaining water over his head, shaking it with a grimace and trying to finger comb the tangles out.

               “Here,” Bucky said, handing him a comb he’d charmed off a young woman with the promise of bringing it back.  He pulled out the scissors she’d given him as well. “When you’re done, I’ll trim your hair and beard.”

               “Praise be to God,” Tony breathed in Arabic, turning the well bucket over so that he could sit on it.  Bucky got to work, easing the comb through the tangles in Tony's thick hair.  Soon his hair was short enough that it was starting to curl as it dried and his beard was trimmed back to reveal a strong jaw and wide, mobile mouth. “Well, my betrothed?” He asked, holding his arms out and turning a slow circle. “How do I look?”

               “Good,” Bucky said honestly, fighting the urge to run his fingers over the newly revealed features of Tony's face.  The clothes fit better than he would have expected, and the quick trim of his hair and beard had worked wonders; he was even more handsome than Bucky had originally thought.  He balled up Tony’s old clothes and gestured back towards the market before his body betrayed his thoughts. “Let’s give these back to that clothier and I’ll return the comb and scissors.”

               Tony followed, running his hands through his hair, clearly well pleased with its length; Bucky noticed that he even stood straighter, as if the bath and new clothes had cast off the final remaining yoke of his imprisonment.  “Are you sure we can’t buy a horse?” Tony said, unaware of Bucky’s gaze as he looked wistfully at the line of mounts tethered at the edge of the market. 

               “Do you know how much they are asking for those horses? Like sixty denarii,” Bucky said with disgust, having overheard the merchant haggling with a man earlier. When Tony cocked his head and blinked at him, Bucky said, “Three schillings?” Tony was still staring at him blankly, so Bucky tried to do the math in a currency Tony would understand, wishing he knew the current exchange rates.  “A whole gold florin?”

               “And that’s…a lot?” Tony said slowly and Bucky cast his eyes skyward in a prayer for patience, wondering just how much money Tony had.

               “Yes. A lot. More than I'm willing to spend right now, that's for sure."

               Tony thought for a moment and pulled out one of his metal picks.  “What could I trade this for?”

               Bucky glanced at the pick as he stepped to the side to allow a wagon full of caged chickens go by.  “Pig iron? Not enough for a horse.”

               “It’s not pig iron, it’s wootz.”

               “What?”

               “Wootz steel.  Ukku?”

               Bucky stopped and pulled Tony between two stalls, out of the busy street.  “Let me see.”  Tony obediently handed over one of the picks and sure enough, now that Bucky was looking at it in the bright light of day, the unassuming metal rods had the characteristic flowing, banded patterns of wootz.  The amount in each pick was good for a good sized dagger of prized Damascus steel, maybe even a sword if put together.  Which mean that this whole time Tony had been carrying more wealth than Bucky could claim in his entire life and was using it to pick rocks out of a horse’s foot. “What, exactly, did the Ten Rings have you doing for them?” He asked carefully as the handed the pick back, which to the right trader would be at least enough for a pair of horses and a wagon to hitch them to, maybe even enough to fill up the back with food and clothes.

               “Smithing,” Tony said, and Bucky nodded as if that made sense.  Which it didn’t, mostly.  It explained the clear strength in Tony’s arms and shoulders, but like sapping, smithing was an extremely difficult skill that took a lifetime to master, even such simple things as nails and chisels.  But forging weapons, and with wootz no less, was a skill know by...well Bucky didn't know how many exactly, but he knew they could be counted on two hands.

               “With that? The wootz?”  Bucky asked just to make sure.  He made a note to himself to stop being surprised by anything Tony told him from now on; at this point Tony could reveal that he was the Princeps of Jerusalem and Bucky would believe him. 

               “Kind of.  I’ve been making knives, swords, daggers, maces, you name it out of regular iron. Then the Ten Rings went on a raid and came back with the wootz, wanting me to make weapons out of it, so then I knew I had to escape. I made these, and,” Tony shrugged, “you know the rest.”

               Bucky was so busy trying to figure out how and why a clearly rich nobleman like Tony would know his way around a forge that he almost missed Tony’s words.  “What do you mean, you had to escape? Why then?”

               “Well, before then I was making them shitty weapons while I waited for my ransom,” Tony said, as if that should have been obvious. “When they came back with broken swords, if they came back at all, I blamed it on the bad iron they were giving me.  I wasn’t going to start making them _good_ weapons,” he said, waving the wootz pick at Bucky. “So I fled. I took these with me because one of the reasons why I came to the Holy Land was to figure out how to make Damascus steel.”

               That was when a whole new comprehension dawned.  “Jesus Christ and all the Saints,” Bucky breathed when he realized just how much trouble they were in.  “We’re going to die.”  Hydra was one thing; Bucky had known when he'd fled Hydra that he would be lucky if he could leave the Levant with his life intact.  But the Ten Rings...they would stop at nothing to kill or recapture Tony because he’d made fools of them and then fled with a not inconsiderable amount of their ill-gotten goods.  It wasn’t Hydra’s style to attack Bucky overtly, but the Ten Rings would have no compunction about killing as many other people as necessary to get to Tony. And they were still two days from Acre, two days with some of the most feared organizations in the region looking for them.   "We have to leave. Right now."

               “What do you mean?" Tony looked around as if he expected to see someone charging towards them.

               "We are putting this town in danger by being here," Bucky said bluntly. He was exhausted and had already paid their host for the night, along with dinner, but knowing now what he did he realized that it was too risky to stay in this town for even one night.  He hitched their bag of recently purchased supplies over his shoulder and turned around to leave the market.

               "So what are we going to do?” Tony said.  “If we are going to be a danger wherever we go, shouldn’t we get a horse and ride for Acre as quickly as possible?”

               “You and those damn horses,” Bucky muttered, feeling queasy at the thought.  But he knew Tony was right; their only advantage right now was that neither Hydra nor the Ten Rings would have any idea which direction they was fleeing, but the longer they took to get to where they were going, the more chances there were that an informant for either group would recognize one of them. “Fine,” he sighed, exhaustion and tension creating a band around his head, making it hard to think.  “Let’s go get a horse.”

               “Should we get two?”

               “No!” Bucky shuddered at the thought. “No more horses than strictly necessary.”

               Tony made a funny face at that, a mix between baffled and disbelieving and entertained, but thankfully he didn’t say anything as he followed Bucky through the market to the livestock section, eyeing the horses critically.   “This one,” he said finally after wandering up and down the line of tethered horses. 

               Bucky looked at the horse with dismay.  It was one of the larger ones still for sale, sandy colored with a dark mane and tail that looked disturbingly intelligent compared to the sleepy eyed one beside it.  As Tony had stroked its nose and checked its teeth its ears had been pricked forward attentively, listening to Stark's running commentary.  “But…” he started, but at Tony’s raised eyebrow he swallowed his complaint manfully and went to go barter for the damned beast.  It took longer than Bucky wanted, but finally he returned with a bridle, a thick blanket, and a bastard sword in a plain leather sheath  He kept the sword but handed the other two to Tony as the merchant untethered the horse and handed the lead rope to Bucky, who promptly handed it and the bridle to Tony.

               “This is also for you,” he said, handing the bastard sword to Tony when he was done with the bridle and had thrown the blanket over the horse’s back.  “I assume you know how to use it?”

               “Sure,” Tony said, drawing the blade from the sheath and hefting it experimentally.  The few thrusts and parries he did with it told Bucky that he had likely been trained on a rapier, but the bastard sword would do as well. 

               “Good.  Then I guess it’s time to go,” Bucky said, eyeing the horse warily and making no move to get closer to it.

               “Is there a problem, dear?” Tony asked, his face so carefully blank that Bucky knew he was being laughed at.

               “You first,” he said, holding his hands out for Tony to step into. Tony climbed onto the horse and took the reins, soothing the beast with a murmur when it stamped a foot at the sudden weight on its back.  When Bucky still made no move to get on the horse Tony tipped his head towards a large wooden box off to the side of the market.

               “There’s a mounting block over there,” he said. “If you need help.”

               Bucky gritted his teeth and stalked towards the block, wondering if maybe it wouldn’t just be better to walk to Acre and risk getting murdered.  But with Tony watching him, eyes amused but understanding, he forced himself onto the horse.  Everything was ok until it started moving, and the sudden movement made Bucky grab onto Tony’s waist perhaps a little too tightly.

               “I take it you haven’t ridden much?” Tony asked lightly, turning the animal’s head towards the southern road out of the town, carefully guiding them through the crowd.

               “On the contrary,” Bucky forced out. “I have ridden _entirely too much_.”

               “Ah.” He patted Bucky's hand soothingly where they were fisted in his shirt. Once they were clear of town, he clicked his tongue and kicked his heels, urging the horse into a trot and leaving Bucky to hold on for dear life and pray for death.


	4. Good Man with a Dark Past

               Even after they had slowed to a walk to rest the horse, Bucky was holding on to Tony so tight he could feel the pounding of his heart against his back. As they rode Tony could feel Bucky leaning more and more against him, as if even the effort of sitting upright was more than he could manage.

               “We’re going to stop for a while,” Tony said, reining the horse in as they passed through a particularly robust stand of trees.  As they left the arid plains and approached the coast, the landscape had grown green and wooded, the tall cedars that this part of the region was known for reaching into the sky and providing some relief from the hot sun. Bucky didn’t protest as he let Tony help him dismount and followed him deeper into the trees until they found a decent rivulet to drink from and refill their flasks.

               They ate in relative silence, Bucky’s shoulders and back drooping with exhaustion.  “Rest,” Tony said, hobbling the horse nearby and removing its bridle so it could graze in the undergrowth.  “I’ll keep watch.”

               As the shadows grew longer, Tony listened to Bucky’s rhythmic breathing while mentally proving the Pythagorean theorem in as many ways as he could think of, sometimes scratching notes into the dirt until it grew too dark to see.  As the night grew chilly, he pulled his knees up to his chest and moved closer to Bucky, pressing his hip to the broad expanse of Bucky’s back.   The horse was a slightly lighter smudge against the rest of the forest, his hide occasionally dappled with silver when the moon came out from behind a cloud.  Tony was still trying to decide if he felt safer or more creeped out in the forest at night than he was in the desert when a movement caught his eye.  The horse had raised its head, ears pointed attentively at something in the forest, and it took a small step forward until its hobble brought it up short.

               “Oh shit,” Tony whispered, and put a hand on Bucky’s shoulder to shake him awake. “Bucky,” he hissed as the horse nickered softly. “I think we have company.”

               Impressively, Bucky was awake instantly, rolling to his feet and drawing a dagger in one swift motion.  He pulled Tony to his feet as well and urged him deeper into the forest, trying to move as silently as possible.  Finally they found a recently fallen tree whose canopy had made a thick tangle of leaves and branches on the forest floor.  “Hide here,” Bucky ordered.  “I’ll to take care of this.”

               “Wait-“  Tony started to protest but Bucky was already gone.  Tony hid among the branches for the count of fifty, feeling virtuous for following Bucky’s orders, then made his way back to where they’d been camping, trying to imitate Bucky’s silent, prowling walk.  He pulled out his bastard sword, ears and eyes straining, and heard a muffled thump from off to his left.  Pausing, he breathed slowly and shallowly, and was rewarded with the sound of branches sliding off leather and the flash of a dagger caught in a stray beam of moonlight.  The other man was making his way slowly to where Bucky and Tony had been resting, and unless he changed directions, he was going to pass right in front of Tony without seeing him.

               Tony waited until the last possible moment to raise his sword, not wanting to give away his position, when Bucky dropped from above right in front of the creeping assassin.  “Boo,” Bucky said, and then with a quick lunge Tony buried a solid five inches of steel into the ambusher’s back and he dropped to the ground with a gasp and a gurgle.   “Well done,” Bucky commented, nudging the body with his toe.  “But I thought I told you to hide.”

               “I did, for a while,” Tony said, wiping his sword off on the assassin’s clothes.  “Are there any more?”

               “No, this was the last one.  Four of them.”  Bucky stooped and picked up the dagger that the man had dropped.

               “Oh, are we looting? I’ve always wanted to loot,” Tony said, rolling the dead guy over to search him.  “Are we looking for anything in particular?“

               “Who they are would be nice,” Bucky said.  “And money, of course. Food.”

               The guy Tony was searching didn’t have any helpful notes with his name on him, but aside from the daggers he’d been wielding Tony found a knife in his boot.  Curious, he stepped into a pool of moonlight to examine it.  “These guys are from the Ten Rings,” he said, and handed the knife to Bucky.  “I made this.”

               “Really?” Bucky made a thoughtful face and examined it, testing the edge and hefting it to get a feel for the balance.

               “Don’t be too impressed,” Tony said dryly.  “It looks good but it will break the second or third time you use it.”

               “That’s almost even more impressive.” Bucky tucked the knife in the small of his back and turned away.  “I’ll go check the others.”

               “And I’ll check on Sandy,” Tony said, heading back to where they had hobbled the horse.

               “Who the hell is Sandy?”

               “The horse,” Tony said over his shoulder. “I can’t believe we left him defenseless.”

               “You named the _horse?”_ Bucky shook his head, incredulous. _“_ Never mind, of course you did.   I’m sure the beast that can cave in a man’s chest with one kick and can break a man’s arm with its teeth is just fine.”

               “You don’t know that!” But Sandy was fine, of course; no doubt the Ten Rings had spared him because they planned to take him back with them once they killed Tony and Bucky.  He whickered into Tony’s palm, lipping at his hand gently in search of treats.  “Don’t listen to Bucky,” Tony murmured to him, scratching his chin.  “He’s just afraid of horses and doesn’t know you like I do.”  He clipped the lead rope onto the simple halter they’d left on and started gathering up their things, knowing they would need to leave as soon as possible.

               It wasn’t long before Bucky returned with an armful of supplies, some of which he packed in the bag that was slung over Sandy’s back and some that disappeared into his clothes.  “Good loot?” Tony said as he watched.

               “Not as much as I’d hoped,” Bucky said shortly, clearly preoccupied.

               “What’s wrong?”

               “For them to be carrying so few supplies, they either have an outpost nearby or they’ve come a long way and hadn’t resupplied yet.”  Bucky started walking and Tony followed, leading Sandy through the dark forest.  “But I didn’t find horses, so.”

               “There’s an outpost nearby,” Tony finished. “So we are in for another nighttime hike, then.”

               “Think it would be safe to ride?”  Bucky asked, which told Tony volumes about how worried Bucky was about the attempted ambush tonight.  As they left the cover of the trees, Tony evaluated the light from the half-moon and the quality of the road. 

“We could, but we’d have to go so slow we may as well be walking,” he answered finally.  “Unless we find a Roman road close to Acre, they are much better maintained.”

               Bucky only grunted and started walking, setting a brisk pace and doing that thing with his head that made him look like an owl, turning it constantly like he expected them to be attacked at any moment.  For the first few miles, Tony kept silent, trying not to distract Bucky from his vigilance, but eventually the landscape got too monotonous to endure.

               “Why don’t you like talking about yourself?” Tony said out of nowhere, surprising Bucky enough that his head jerked over to meet Tony’s eyes and he stumbled over a rock in the road.

               “Where the hell did that come from?” he demanded instead of answering, scowling and kicking the rock out of the way before turning his attention back to their surroundings.

               “All this time, you’ve never shared anything about yourself except your name,” Tony said.  “You don’t even have an accent so I have no idea where you are from.”

               They walked in silence for a few more minutes. Tony kept his peace because he could tell Bucky was struggling with something.  “I’m from Wallachia,” he said eventually.  “I think.  I don’t talk about myself because nothing good will come of it.  I’ve done a lot of very bad things that I wish I could forget.”

               Tony felt a pang in his chest at the self-hatred in Bucky’s words. “That doesn’t mean…I mean, surely there must be something-”

               “No,” Bucky said with finality, shaking his head.  “Helping you might be the only good thing I’ve ever done.”

               Tony had no idea what to say to that.  He _knew_ , in a way he couldn’t put into words, that Bucky wasn’t a bad person; he knew if Rhodey were here he would probably say that the offer of payment in Acre was a good incentive to at least _act_ like a good guy, and that there was a strong possibility that as soon as they got to Acre Bucky was going to rob him.  But Tony kept thinking about the unexpected, unnecessary thoughtfulness of Bucky getting a comb and scissors for him, of him patiently working the comb through Tony’s tangled hair and trimming his beard until he felt like a new man.   Or the fact that Bucky bought him his own sword then trusted Tony to watch over him while he slept; in Tony’s experience, the most untrustworthy people were also the least trusting.  Bucky’s true story lay somewhere between _Wallachia, I think_ and _a lot of bad things_ , and as they walked in silence through the dark hours of the early morning, Tony prayed he would one day earn enough of Bucky’s trust to learn what it was.

               “It’s light enough to ride,” Bucky said eventually, breaking the awkward silence between them.  Tony only nodded and accepted Bucky’s boost to get on Sandy’s back, then braced himself to help Bucky climb on.  He started to gather the reins but Bucky stopped him.  “I know you’re tired,” Bucky said.  On the horse, they were close enough that Bucky was talking right into his ear, and Tony suppressed a shiver at the feeling of Bucky’s warm breath on his neck and jaw.

               “I can-” Tony started to protest, but Bucky shushed him.

               “You don’t need to.  Even I can steer a horse well enough to stay on a road.  You need to rest.”  Bucky held the reins in one hand and urged Tony to move until he was sitting sideways, halfway on Bucky’s lap and curled a little so he could rest his head on Bucky’s shoulder.  It felt like a very intimate position, despite the fact they were both fully clothed and sitting on a horse in the middle of a road; any passerby would think that they were lovers and Tony felt a giddy thrill at the thought.  “Sleep,” Bucky ordered, his voice a deep rumble in Tony’s ear.  He closed his eyes gratefully, and had just enough time to think that he liked the way Bucky smelled, the leather and sweat and sharp scent of honing oil, before he fell asleep.

 

               Bucky could feel the moment that Tony fell asleep, the way his body went limp and trusting against Bucky’s chest.  Even as he cursed himself for his stupidity, Bucky pressed his cheek against Tony’s soft brown hair for just a moment before straightening.  He’d never met a man that was so easy to get along with, but it had lulled him into complacency; Tony’s questions had blindsided him and left him shaken with the reminder that none of this was real.   Soon enough they would reach Acre, Tony would return to his home, and Bucky would have a small chunk of change to build a new life around.  The life of a mercenary was hard and often lonely, but at least it was honest and Bucky would be free to choose his own path.

               Sighing, Bucky forced himself to turn his thoughts from the uncertain future and pay attention to their surroundings.  It was unlikely that the Ten Rings could muster another attack so soon, but he was not prepared to risk Tony’s life on such an assumption, so every passing traveler got a gimlet glare until they hurried past.   Eventually the packed dirt road became paved, though rutted with centuries of passing wagons, and from the increasingly large and elaborate buildings it became clear that they were approaching a big city.  As the traffic increased, it wasn’t long before Tony woke, but apparently he seemed satisfied to continue to lean against Bucky as they rode because he didn’t immediately sit up or offer to take over.  Now their progress slowed as their path was blocked by wagons and livestock and people blocking the lanes; perhaps one too many people had looked at them and smirked because Tony finally sat up with a sigh, stretched, and shifted until he was straddling the horse again.   Bucky hadn’t realized until now how this position nestled Tony’s backside right against his groin, so he quickly scooted back a little lest he embarrass himself by enjoying it too much. 

               Another sign of a big city revealed itself in the form of the itinerant poor that clumped together at street corners, the blind and crippled and hungry mendicants reaching out with their hands or cheap wooden bowls to people passing by.

               “Do you have any pennies for them?” Tony asked, eyes softening at the mumbling prayers of the beggars as they sat by the side of the street. 

               Bucky eyed the small crowd, recognizing at least three of them as pickpockets from the way their shifty eyes were sizing up travelers.  “The minute someone takes out their purse, they swarm,” he warned Tony.  “If you wish to help them, it would be far better to donate to the churches and mosque that provide charitable services for them.”

               “I do and I will,” Tony said.  “But I can’t pass by without giving them _something.”_

               Bucky sighed and started to argue when he realized that Tony was doing something with his eyes that made them appear bigger and limpid and was looking up at Bucky through his thick eyelashes, biting his lips.  Bucky felt an overwhelming bubble of affection and amusement when he realized Tony was trying to manipulate him.  “Very well,” he said, reaching into an inside pocket of his shirt.  “Enough with the baby fawn-eyes.”

               Tony smiled and kissed Bucky’s cheek before leaning over and dropping pennies into bowls, a couple for each person.  A subtle kick to the horse’s side made it prance a little and the beggars kept their distance from the ringing hooves.  “I’ll pay you back,” Tony promised as they rode deeper into Acre.  “We’re almost there.”

               “No, don’t worry about it,” Bucky said with a shrug, cheek still tingling from Tony's unexpected kiss.  He fought the urge to touch it.  "It's Hydra’s blood money, anyway.  It should go to a better cause.”

               The center of Acre was overwhelming, the bustling port city teeming with people from all over the known world; merchants and traders from all races and creeds jostled for space while farmers and sailors and local artisans haggled for wares.  After so many hours on the road in relative silence, the clamor of people and the smells of spices, food, and livestock were overwhelming.  Normally Bucky would only be here if he were on a mission, in which case the crowd would be a convenient cover. Now, however, trying to navigate a horse through the crowd while simultaneously keeping an eye out for potential assassins was making Bucky…tense.

               “Over there,” Tony said, pointing to an alley off the main street that was much quieter.  “If I remember correctly, this will take us to the Templars.” 

               “So how does this work?” Bucky asked, staring up at the huge stone edifice that was the Knights Templar outpost in Acre.  Given that the Knights were the sworn enemies of Hydra, among others, being this close to their fortress was making Bucky nervous.  “Surely you don’t just walk in there, say you are Tony Stark, and they give you all your money.”

               “No, normally they give you a letter of deposit,” Tony said as he swung his leg over the horse and dismounted.  “But as an extra level of security, my best friend Rhodey had me also add a passcode because he knows how bad I am at losing papers.  If anyone showed up with the letter but couldn’t describe my birthmark, they were to be arrested.”

               “Your birthmark?” Bucky repeated, remembering when he had seen Tony mostly naked, which he definitely didn’t think about very often at all.  “I don’t remember seeing a birthmark.”

               He didn’t realize what he was saying until Tony looked at him with a grin and raised eyebrows.  “Oh, so you were paying attention, hmm?” he said with an amused, exaggerated leer.  “I suppose that’s allowed since you’re my fiancé, but since we apparently _anticipated our vows_ I’m surprised you don’t remember it. Honestly, I’m hurt.”

               Bucky groaned and tried to kick out at Tony, but then immediately regretted it when it made the horse move and left him scrambling for the reins.  “Shut up,” he scowled.  “Go do whatever you have to do to get your money, I don’t want to be waiting around with this beast forever.”

               Tony tsked and patted the horse on the shoulder.  “Be patient, Sandy, I know he can be difficult.  I’ll be quick.”

               He was not, in fact, quick.  Eventually Bucky slid off the horse’s back and led it to a small pasture to crop at the patchy grass while he kept an eye out for Tony. After hours passed, however, Bucky began to get worried; first he started pacing, then he eventually secured the horse’s reins to a rock and started walking around the castle, coming up with increasingly elaborate rescue plans as he grew convinced that somehow the Templars had been behind Tony’s captivity all along. 

               He’d done one full circle of the fortress when he saw that Tony was finally back, leaning against the horse like he hadn’t just given Bucky a heart attack.  “I’m sorry it took so long,” he said as Bucky scowled at him.  “It took a while for them to verify my identity because apparently I had been reported dead and in my absence there had been multiple attempts to retrieve my funds.”

               There was a funny note in Tony’s voice that cut through Bucky’s righteous anger.  “What’s wrong?” he asked, but Tony just shook his head, jaw tight.

               “Not here,” he said, reaching down for the bags that had been stacked at his feet.  “We will talk later, when we’re safe.”


	5. Fake it 'til You Make It

               For all that Acre was a major port city, the selection of ships willing to take passengers was frustratingly small.  They had gone straight from the fortress to find a place to stable the horse, which had become more of a hassle than a help in the heavily crowded roads of Acre.  Over Tony's protests, he left Tony with his recently recovered riches at the stable to scout out the docks.

               “So the next boat leaving Acre is going to Venice by way of Alexandria and Crete but it doesn’t leave for another five days,” Bucky said when he returned, making a sympathetic face when Tony groaned in disappointment.

               “So what will we do?”

               "To be honest, I'm not sure," Bucky had tried to come up with a plan on his way back from the docks, but nothing brilliant had occurred to him, aside from finding a room in an inn or boarding house and blockading the door until the ship was ready to sail.  It would make them a sitting target, but moving from inn to inn would simply open them up for an ambush or robbery.

               "Well, I have an idea," Tony said, sounding strangely hesitant. "Do you trust me?" 

               "Of course," Bucky said with a frown. "I trust you with my life every time I get on that God cursed beast," he added, pointing at the horse that was lazily lipping at the hay in its manger. 

               "No, I mean, do you trust my judgement? I think I know what we should do."

               "Okay," Bucky said after a moment.  Frankly, any move he made could probably be second-guessed by Hydra, so maybe letting someone else make the plan would throw them off the track.  "I'll follow your lead."

               Apparently Tony's mysterious plas involved attempting to spend all of his recently recovered funds in one big shopping spree.  The first step, which Bucky had no complaints with, was a hot meal that they both inhaled along with the best wine Bucky'd had in his entire life.  The second was some time in a hammam, which Bucky started to protest until he saw how excited Tony was, so he let himself relax a little in the hot water with Tony's gold and his sword within reach at all times.  When Tony gave him the baby-fawn eyes, Bucky even let a barber trim his hair and beard though it went against every instinct he had to allow someone near his face with sharp objects. The third step in Tony's plan was buying new clothes, and that's where Bucky tried to put his foot down.

               "We are going to stand out like sore thumbs in these clothes," Bucky protested when he saw the kind of store Tony was dragging him to. 

               “We have to look the part,” Tony insisted.  “We can't introduce ourselves dressed like this.”

               “Introduce ourselves?”

               “To the King’s Court in Acre,” Tony said as if that were obvious, which was enough to give Bucky pause for long enough that Tony found the right tailor and swept inside his shop.  It was clear that this was Tony’s element; as hesitant as Tony had been at the farmer’s market in Assayidat, he was charming here, flattering and cajoling the tailor into selling them two sets of clothes that had been made for someone else and only needed the slightest of adjustments to fit them.   The gold coin that Tony sent dancing through his fingers earned them the promise of two more on the morrow, and just like that, Bucky had to give up his plain but sturdy and serviceable uniform for the silks and satins of Crusader fashion, dyed a deep blue with silver accents.  He ducked into a curtained nook to change, frowning as he ran out of places to hide his weapons and feeling a little naked because of it.  But it fit well enough, and he could move in it, which was the real concern; the fact that he felt a bit like a gilded idiot was less important.

               Tony didn't seem to have any complaints, however; when Bucky came out of the changing room, he looked like he'd gotten punched in the chest.  Then his face had gotten red and his eyes darted away, making Bucky feel more than a little bit smug. Then it was Tony's turn to change, and when he came out Bucky could understand how he'd felt. Tony had claimed the outfit that was patterned with gold and red, claiming that it was the colors of the Stark house.  Bucky had to admit that the colors flattered him, bringing out the swarthiness of his skin and making his hair and beard shine.  The cut of the clothes emphasized the breadth of his shoulders and narrowness of his waist, the length of his legs and graceful turn of his wrist. For a moment he looked every inch the arrogant noble until the glimmer of amusement in his eyes and quirk of his mouth broke the illusion.

               “Most flattering, my lord,” the tailor gushed, clearly seeing the prospect of more gold in his future.  “You will cut quite a figure at court.”

               “Yes, I believe so,” Tony agreed, strapping his bastard sword to his waist.  Before, the sword belt and sheath was the most expensive part of Tony’s clothes; now they stuck out against his clothes like a weed in a garden of roses.   “I’ll send a messenger for the rest tomorrow.”

               “Yes, sir,” the tailor said, and probably didn’t stop bowing until Tony and Bucky were around the next street corner.

               “Impressive,” Bucky said, rolling his shoulders in the unfamiliar fit of his new coat.  “You had that guy bent around your finger.”

               “It's amazing how eager people are to help you when you pay them on time,” Tony said with a wry shrug.  “Many of my peers seem to think that sort of thing is below them." 

               They eventually made their way out of the lower part of the city and into the larger houses that occupied the hills of Acre, away from the docks and the teeming marketplaces that grew up around them.  Tony explained that he had spend some weeks here when he'd first come to the Holy Land, introducing himself to the local nobility and following the myriad social conventions required of him before he could embark on the rest of his trip without offending anyone.  Bucky could only roll his eyes when Tony said things like "and of course, once I called on the duke you  _have_ to visit the Marquess and Marchioness or you will never hear the end of it," as he followed him through the clearly moneyed neighborhoods.  Eventually Tony stopped in front of one building with heavy, elaborately carved doors and hit the knocker.  

               “Antoine Stark, Duke of Anjou, here to see Baron Schonburg,” Tony said haughtily to the servant that answered the door.  The footman eyed Tony’s clothes and his bearing for the barest moment before bowing and gesturing for them to come inside, leading them to a sitting room just off the main hall.  Bucky took one look at the room and got a sense of what kind of man the Baron was; the room was clearly meant to mimic the rooms of a typical German manor, no matter how out of place the heavy wooden furniture appeared or how expensive it must have been to bring here.  No doubt he was one of those types that felt like he was here to impose civilization upon the natives, even though many cities in the Levant predated the oldest castles of Europe.

               “So. Duke of Anjou?” Bucky said with a raised eyebrow as they waited.   Tony shrugged, pretending to study the furniture but Bucky could see the tips of his ears turning red.  “Tell me, _Your Grace_ ,” Bucky murmured, running a finger suggestively down Tony’s arm and batting his eyelashes flirtatiously.  “Do you have an enormous _c_ _astle_ to go with that impressive title?”

               Bucky’s terrible innuendo surprised a laugh out of Tony.  “I do indeed,” he said seriously, smothering his grin and lifting his head to look down his nose at Bucky, which took some doing since Bucky was half a head taller.  “As a point of fact, my castle is quite well known for the size of its... _tower_.”

               “Scandalous!” Bucky said, trying to look scandalized.  “No wonder you were doing penance for anticipating your marriage vows.”

               “Duke Stark?” A deep voice thickly tinged with German interrupted them.  “By God, it is you.  Rumors were that you had died in a bandit attack!”

               Tony turned on his heel and just that fast, Tony Stark disappeared and was replaced by the Duke.  He smiled, a wide, false one that didn’t reach his eyes.  Bucky hated it on sight.  “Baron,” Tony said with a slight, carefully calculated bow.  “It is such a pleasure to see you again. As you can see, the rumors of my demise are overstated.  It would take much more than a few ragged bandits to be the death of me.” 

               “So I see,” the baron said, giving Tony a heart slap on the shoulder.  “And who is this?”

               “May I introduce Iacobus Seneslau, Voivode of Croatia,” Tony said.  Bucky bowed, somewhat deeper than Tony had.  The baron looked like a man who had been well muscled once but had somewhat gone to seed since his youth, with a graying beard and soft hands. “I owe Voivode Seneslau my life,” Tony said.  “So I said I would assist with his introduction into the King’s court.”

               “Voivode, eh?" The baron repeated, studying Bucky with a thoughtful grunt.  What brings you to the Levant? You are a long way from Croatia.”

               Over Tony’s pretense of a smile, his eyes were a warning, but Bucky merely bowed his head in acknowledgement; this was a game he’d been trained to play.  “King Coloman has had some unfortunate disputes with Crusaders crossing into his kingdom on their way to Constantinople, so he sent me to treat with the King of Jerusalem.  On my way here, however, I ran across the Duke being pursued by bandits and intervened."

               "Really?  Please, sit, I must hear this story.” The Baron gestured for them to take a seat and rang for the servant.  “Bring us refreshments,” he ordered when the footman reappeared.  “Bring us the new French wine in honor of the return of my good friend Duke Stark. Now,” he said, lacing his fingers together and resting them on his barrel chest as he sat back against the couch.  “Tell me everything, from the beginning.  I believe that the last I spoke with you it was-”

               "In May, yes," Tony finished.  Since this was Tony’s show, Bucky mostly let him tell the story, being sure to step in when it was his cue.  Judging from the way the Baron listened, rapt, this was likely the most interesting thing to happen to the nobles of the city for some time.  If He and Bucky weren’t so desperate to leave the Holy Land, they could likely dine on this story for weeks. 

               He was just started to feel his exhaustion when Tony masterfully manipulated the Baron into offering them a place to stay; the cost, it seemed, was that the Baron would put together an intimate dinner with some of his “closest friends” tomorrow, no doubt eager to capitalize on the dramatic story of a Duke’s imprisonment and daring escape as well as the opportunity to introduce an exotic newcomer.

               “I’ll have a plate sent up for dinner,” the Baron promised as the footman led them to their rooms.  “I’ll be in my study if you need anything.” 

               Bucky waited for just enough time for the footman to leave before he slipped into Tony's room. 

               “Finally,” Tony said as Bucky closed the door behind him.  He'd already started stripping out of his heavy, elaborate clothes, tossing them over the foot of the bed.  Bucky sat down in one of he chairs that surrounded a small table and suppressed a groan; the strain of the last week and the last few days in particular were beginning to make itself known.  

               “So what did the Templars say that has you so upset?”  Bucky asked as Tony sat down heavily on the mattress in only a thin tunic and his smallclothes.  “Is it because someone was trying to have you declared dead?”

               “Yes.  That means that that whole time I was being held by the Ten Rings, waiting for a rescue or a ransom, neither were coming because everyone thought I was dead.”  He fell back against the mattress, rubbing his eyes tiredly. “As  scary as that is, what is more important is that whoever tried to have me declared dead so they could claim my funds had my letter of credit. Which had been lost when the Ten Rings attacked my caravan.”

                “So someone from the Ten Rings tried to get your money?”

               “That’s just it.” Tony turned his head to look at Bucky, eyes troubled. “The Templars said that the person who arrived to claim my money was French. I didn’t recognize the man that they described, but it had to be someone that knew I had come here, knew I had been attacked, but didn’t know that I had taken extra steps to secure my money.”

               “And had somehow gotten their hands on your letter of credit."  Bucky frowned, not liking the picture that was starting to form in his head.

               “Exactly,”  Tony sighed.  “I need to get home as fast as possible.  There’s no telling what kind of chaos my estates are in.”

               "Do you think the Baron be willing to host us for the week until the ship leaves?   If we stay here it will make it much more difficult for the Ten Rings to reach you.”

               "That was my thinking," Tony said, pushing himself back up to sit on the edge of the bed.  "The Baron is a particularly genial but aggressive social climber so I knew he wouldn't ask too many questions if he thought he could get some social capital out of it."

               “Clever," Bucky said approvingly. "But the bad news is that Hydra is well able to operate in these circles, so the risk to me is likely higher.”

               " _Merde._ " Tony slumped in disappointment.  “So is there a middle ground? Too important for Ten Rings, not important enough for Hydra?”

               Bucky smiled.  “While I appreciate your willingness to give up all of this,” he said, waving at the richly dyed curtains and tightly woven carpets of the Baron’s guest room, “it’s unnecessary.  I am well used to how Hydra operates.  I was their best, so I am not afraid of anyone they would send after me.  Well, perhaps one,” he amended.  “But I know her well, like a sister.  They would be foolish to send her against me.”

                "And what about the cover story? I'm sorry I didn't clear it with you beforehand, but I just remembered at the last second you didn't want anyone to think of you as my bodyguard-"

               "No, it's fine," Bucky said.  Their conversation was interrupted for a moment as the footman brought up a plate for their dinner, so they stood around awkwardly while he set everything out for them.  "But I was just thinking, if we lean on the Voivode angle, there’s no reason for me to stay close to you, so..." Bucky took a deep breath and fiddled with his food, feeling ridiculously shy all of a sudden.  “I know with the nobility an engagement creates certain, ah,  _expectations,_ so we could just say we are courting, if you’d prefer. _"_

               For some reason Tony felt disappointed.  “That would probably be better,” he agreed, trying to sound pleased with the idea.  “So, what, you rescued me and fell helplessly in love with me?”  _If only._   “And now we are courting?”

                “That's what I was thinking.”

               Tony nodded gamely at Bucky’s expectant look. “Sounds like a good plan.  After all, it’s not likely you actually have to go through the whole,” Tony gestured vaguely, “song and dance of actual courting or anything, just make it look convincing.”

               Bucky looked offended.  “You think I don’t know how to show someone a good time?  I’m going to sweep you off your feet,” he said, sounding so sincere that perhaps Tony could be forgiven for falling a little bit in love with him.


	6. The Courtship Masquerade

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is pure fake dating self-indulgence. I'm not sorry.

               Bucky made a show of going to sleep in his own guest room, but after the house settled into sleep he snuck back into Tony’s room, unwilling to let him out of his site for an entire night. Tony didn’t protest, he only moved over to make room with a sleepy noise that was unfairly endearing. Unsurprisingly, they both slept heavily that night, finally feeling safe and secure behind sturdy walls and locked doors.  Bucky woke once at the first muezzin call, opened his eyes just long enough to make sure that Tony was still safe and asleep beside him, and fell right back to sleep until the footman knocked on the door announcing breakfast. 

               “I’ll be there shortly,” Tony called out, and then they heard the footman knocking on Bucky’s door and calling out when he didn’t get a response.  Bucky and Tony shared a quick look, then Bucky rolled off the far side of the bed while Tony darted for the door.  “Um, the Voivode mentioned that he was going to go out for a, uh, early morning constitutional,” Tony said.  “He said he would return in time for breakfast.”

               “Very good, sir.”

               Tony closed the door and blew out a breath.  “Sorry, it’s all I could think of,” he said.  Bucky just shrugged, not bothered by the fact that he’d have to climb out the window and pretend like he’d been out for a walk.

               “I’ll see you downstairs,” he said before slipping into his room to retrieve his clothes.

               Tony took his time getting dressed, knowing that it wouldn’t do to come down too early, but despite that he was still at the table well before Bucky “returned.”

               “Baron Schonburg,” Bucky said with a bow, his suddenly Slavic accent chewing up his normally perfect French. “Duke Stark.”

               Tony acknowledged his bow with a nod of his head, his attention mostly focused on the mysterious packages under Bucky’s arm.   Apparently he’d decided to add some verisimilitude to his early morning “walk,” somehow still looking dashing in his new clothes despite the fact that he’d had to climb down the side of the house in them.

               “Good morning, Voivode,” the Baron said, halfway through his hearty plate of eggs and sausage, his one concession to the culture outside his door being the piece of toasted flatbread instead of loaf bread on the edge of his plate.  “Did you enjoy your walk?”

               “I did,” Bucky said, setting his packages down as he made a plate for himself from the food on the buffet. Tony eyed the packages; one was distinctly book shaped, and the other was also a box of some sort.  He started to reach over the table to shake it for a clue but Bucky turned around and caught him in the act, raising his eyebrows in chastisement.  Tony returned to his plate sheepishly.  “But I have a question for you, Baron Schonburg, since I am not accustomed to the social niceties outside of my home country.”

               “Please, go ahead,” the baron said graciously, clearly tickled by Bucky’s flattery and appeal to his greater wisdom. 

               “If I wish to proclaim my desire to court someone, is it appropriate to do so in public, with a gift, or is it better done in private?”  Tony felt himself get hot and busied himself with his food, but the Baron didn’t seem to notice, and Bucky wasn’t even glancing in his direction.

               “Is the person, ah, of your affections of age?”

               “Oh, yes, certainly,” Bucky said earnestly.

               “Then in public, is acceptable, but not in front of so large a crowd that it creates an unseemly pressure on them to respond positively to your attentions.  And a gift of, say, flowers or some sort of sweet is certainly a charming way to announce your intentions.”  The baron just now seemed to notice the packages Bucky had put at the end of the table, and put two and two together. “Ah, are we in anticipation of some happy news?” he asked delicately.

               Bucky inclined his head, and stood to walk around the table to where Tony was sitting.  As he went to one knee, Tony found himself getting unexpectedly nervous, for something that he knew was just an act.  He took a few deep breaths to try to calm his racing heart as Bucky presented him with his packages.  “Antoine Stark, Duke of Anjou, I would like to present you with these modest tokens of my affection in the hopes that you would find me favorable,” Bucky said seriously, his eyes steady on Tony’s.  “I know our time together was born of hardship and strife, but I hope that now you will allow me to demonstrate to you the depths of my regard and perhaps, in the future, you might find some warm feelings in your heart for me.”

               Tony could feel the baron’s eyes on him as he opened the gift, carefully undoing the folded brown paper they’d been wrapped in.  “Books,” he said, chest tightening with the irrational urge to cry.  “You got me books.” One was translated into Latin, _Book of Shatranj_ , and the other was still in Arabic. “Dani- danishnama-” he tried to sound out.

               “ _Danishnama i-‘ala’i,_ ” Bucky read to him. “The Book of Scientific Knowledge, by-”

               “Ibn Sina,” Tony finished, recognizing the name at the bottom.  He ran his finger over the embossed gold print, blinking hard so that his tears wouldn’t fall in front of the baron.

               “I thought I could read it to you, and we could discuss it.  Over dinner one day, perhaps?” 

               Tony nodded.  “And this one?” He said, running his fingers over the spine of the other one.  “What is shatranj?”

               Bucky handed him the mysterious second package.  “Shatranj is a game of strategy, common in Persia,” he said as Tony opened the package, revealing the simple black and white checkered board.  He didn’t add that it was the Old Man of the Mountain’s favorite game, and that he would often play with his assassins and lieutenants, with strict punishments for whoever did not provide him with a suitably stimulating game.  “The book is a guide for how to play.” 

               Tony ran his fingers over the tiny carved wooden pieces, speechless.  It was perhaps the most thoughtful gift he’d ever received and he struggled to find the words to express that without revealing himself for the lovesick fool that he was.

               Thankfully, the baron broke the moment before Tony embarrassed himself. “I don’t think you need to worry that your affections are not returned,” the baron said with a wide grin.  “What excellent news! The story of adventure has become a romance!”

               “Thank you,” Tony said once he was confident he could control his voice.  “Believe me, your attentions are not unwelcomed.”  Belatedly he offered his hand, and Bucky took it and pressed a kiss to the back of it.

               “I am well pleased to hear that,” Bucky said with a soft smile as he stood. 

               “Congratulations,” the baron said.  He pushed away from the table and rang for the footman.  “If I am to host an impromptu dinner party tonight, I must quickly dash off the invitations.  Fortunately it is not the high season, so I am confident that we will have enough guests to enjoy ourselves.”  He took his leave with a bow and left Bucky and Tony to their breakfast.

               “These gifts are absolutely lovely,” Tony said honestly.  “Where did you find them?”

               “I noted some stores in passing yesterday,” Bucky said, tucking into his food.  “So, what shall we do today?”

               The smart thing to do would be to stay here, in the relative safety of the Baron’s home.  But after a good night’s sleep, Tony was feeling invincible.  “Do you think it would be safe for us to go out?” he asked quietly so that the baron’s servants wouldn’t overhear. It didn’t really matter where they went, but Tony had noted some curiosity shops close to the docks he had wanted to investigate.  

               Bucky hesitated, and Tony knew he was making the same calculations Tony had.  “Perhaps a short walk,” Bucky said finally, and Tony quickly smothered a victorious grin.

               The baron offered the services of one of his footmen to accompany them, who turned out to be more helpful than Bucky had anticipated as Tony set about spending more of his recovered wealth; he purchased a traveling chest and a lockbox to keep his gold in, then a set of parchment and quills, and then a beautifully forged rapier, until they’d had to send the footman back with all of his purchases.  The whole time Bucky was happy to play the indulgent suitor, tucking Tony’s hand under his arm as they wandered from store to store.  They passed an Arab _baqlawa_ store, full of the region’s distinctive honey and pistachio sweet treats and bought one to share.  Passing by a wine shop led Tony to purchase a crate of imported wine as a thank you to the baron for his hospitality, and then Bucky had to put his foot down before Tony purchased anything else.

               “You should rest before the baron’s party tonight,” Bucky pointed out.  “You still need to regain your strength from your captivity.” Tony protested most of the way home, but it was clear that he was tiring as they climbed the hill back to the baron’s residence.  “You rest,” Bucky insisted over Tony’s token protests.  “I’m going to reread Rumi’s guide to shatranj to refresh my memory.” Tony grudgingly disrobed and laid down in bed while Bucky made himself comfortable at the small table. 

               “Did you see that clock in that store today?” Tony asked after only a few minutes of quiet.

               “Of course I did,” Bucky said. “It was bigger than you.”  And Tony had been entirely too tempted to purchase it, before Bucky had pointed out that it would cost twice as much to take it home with him and probably wouldn't make the voyage in one piece.

               “I want to take it apart to see how it works,” he said, rolling over to look at Bucky.  “Did you notice that it was a mechanical clock, not a water clock?”

               “I did, because you kept pointing it out.”  He’d pressed his face against the wooden frame of the clock, trying to get a look at the gears inside.  The shopkeeper had been looking at him like he was a madman, terrified that this crazy Frenchman was going to break the clock that had been shipped with great care from Mosul.  “Now get some sleep.”

               Tony was only quiet for a few more minutes before he spoke again.  “If I take it apart, I bet I could rebuild it, maybe make it smaller and more portable-”

               “Sleep, Tony,” Bucky said patiently, turning the page in his book.  When he heard Tony inhale like he was going to speak again, he pinned him with a glance.  “If you be quiet I will buy you al-Jazari’s book on mechanical devices,” he said.  “He’s the one that built the clock.”

               Tony’s eyes got round.  “There’s a book?” he breathed.

               “Yes. Al-Jazari describes 100 different mechanical devices with instructions on how to build them.”  Bucky knew about it because the bookseller from this morning had tried to convince Bucky to purchase it along with the Ibn Sina book.  If he’d known how captivated Tony was going to be by the mechanical clock, he would have.  “But you have to sleep.”

               Tony was actually quiet for a long time after that, no doubt enchanted at the idea of 100 different clocks he could build; after a while, Bucky noticed that his breathing was deep and regular, so he put his book down to study the mad genius that he’d discovered in the desert.  Five days, the ship’s captain had said.  Bucky had Tony to himself for a few more days, and he hoped that would be enough to last him the rest of his life, however long that may be.

***

               The dinner party that night turned out to be more entertaining than Bucky would have thought.  The conversation was reasonably interesting, with only a little bit of gossip about people Bucky didn’t know and more conversation on political events, which Bucky _did_ know.   They fielded questions about their adventure all evening, mostly to wide eyed exclamations and more than a few grumbling “we should do something about those pestilent bandits,” but no one seemed interested in delving too deeply into their story, willing to let the subject change as if Tony’s experience was just some thrilling tale of fiction.  Initially, Bucky was offended on Tony’s behalf, but Tony seemed unsurprised.  “I wouldn’t have taken it too seriously either, I think, had it not happened to me,” he said, almost apologetically.  “Most of the peerage are quite frivolous.”  Bucky wanted to protest, because as frivolous as they were, these people had real political power, but he didn’t want to ruin Tony’s fun so he kept his peace.  Especially when, after a few bottles of wine, everyone decided to push the furniture to the side and dance as one person produced a gittern and picked out a lively tune.  Seeing Tony so flushed and happy, laughing as tune went faster and faster and he struggled to keep up, was possibly the most beautiful thing Bucky had ever seen. 

               But despite his rest, Bucky could see that Tony was tiring quickly, as if the manic energy that had driven him across the desert to Acre had pushed him past his natural limits and now his body had to recover its reserves.   But Tony’s spirits were high, and even while he sat and watched others dance he seemed to enjoy himself as he caught up with the people he’d met all those months ago. Eventually, the crowd began to noticeably dwindle, the Baron making slow circuits of the room as guests said their goodbyes.  

               "Would you like to get some fresh air?" Bucky asked when there was a break in Tony's conversation.

               "Oh yes, please," Tony said.  Bucky could see the relief in his eyes as Bucky stood and offered his hand with a bow.  The Baron had a small garden, carefully tended; even at their slowest pace they would be able to do a complete circuit of it in a matter of minutes.  Once outside, Tony took a deep breath and let it out slowly, and Bucky could see carefully pleasant and convivial facade of the Duke of Anjou get put aside like an ill-fitting overcoat.  "I had forgotten how desperate I was to get away from Acre when I was here a few months ago," Tony said ruefully. "I don't normally seek out this much socializing with people I barely know."

               "You are terribly good at it, though," Bucky commented.  "For someone who doesn't like it."

               "It's not that I don't like it, it's that I rarely have the time for it and therefore rarely have the patience for it."  Tony blew out another breath. "Today, for example, I'd much rather be reading the books you gave me than socializing with people I will never see or hear from again."

              Bucky put his hand over Tony's where it was curled around his arm and squeezed it.  "Soon enough you'll be on a ship and you'll have all the time to read that you could want."

               Tony turned his face away but not before Bucky saw the sad curve of his lips.  "You're right," he said, voice full of forced lightness. "I can't wait."              


	7. Last Night Together

               Two nights later, Bucky woke up suddenly from the feeling of a weight dropping into the bed. One hand reached under his pillow for his knife while the other instinctively swung at the intruder, only to find his knife missing and his hand trapped in a painful, unyielding grip. His eyes flew open and met a pair of wide, guileless eyes, just barely lit by the moonlight flooding the room. A woman was crouched above him, a knife a hair’s breadth from his throat while she held one of his hands immobile. Her hair and the bottom half of her face were covered by a dark cloth, but Bucky recognized her anyway; there was only one person in the world that could have gotten the drop on him. He'd hoped he'd have more time, but she'd always been one of the best.

               “Well?” he asked after a moment, voice low, heart still racing.

               The woman released his hand and tugged the cloth down to uncover her mouth. “Who’s the guy?” Natalia whispered, eyes cutting over to where Tony was somehow still fast asleep.

               “A job,” Bucky tried, and Natalia raised an eyebrow and smirked.

               “Uh-huh,” she said skeptically, tapping the flat of the knife twice on Bucky's jaw in chastisement for the lie before it disappeared.   “I heard you were courting him.  You work fast.”

               “I needed a reason to stay close by. He’s paying me to get him on a boat back to France without getting captured or killed by the Ten Rings,” Bucky said, which was the truth.  Bucky’s tangled knot of feelings about Tony and the thought of him leaving was Bucky’s problem and not something he wanted to talk about, not even to Natalia.

               Natalia raised her eyebrows again but didn't press any further.  “And you? Where are you going?”

               “I don’t know.  Away.”  Natalia made a thoughtful noise.  “You could come with me,” he said.  “He's paying me enough for both of us to make a new life somewhere.”

               Natalia was shaking her head before he even finished speaking.  “No, now that you are free I am going to tear it all down. The Old Man, the safe houses and spies.  All of it. I don't care what they say, nothing good can come of an organization so evil.”

               Bucky wasn't surprised; this had been something they'd talked about many times, in hushed whispers in dark corners of the Old Man's mountaintop fortress. If anyone could do it, it was Natalia.  The Old Man had never been shy about expressing his distaste for his only female operative, and Natalia had been using that attitude to dig up all of his secrets for years now.  “Good. What do you need?”

               “Just to know you are safe."

               "I can help you-"

               "No," Natalia said sharply.  She captured his chin in her hand to make sure he knew she was serious.  "I need you out of the way for this, understand? You're my only weakness." After a long moment, Bucky nodded reluctantly. Natalia gave him a kiss on each cheek. "I can buy you a few days at most.  Be gone by then,” she ordered as she climbed off the bed.

               He sat up and watched her vanish out the window but didn’t bother pursuing her.  With a sigh, he ran a hand over his face and slid out from between the sheets, knowing that there would be no more sleep tonight.  Tony's dressing robe, another impulse purchase on their ill-advised jaunt around town, was laying over the back of the chair so Bucky slipped it on against the chill of the night.  He stared sightlessly out the window at the glittering stars that shone over the sleeping city, thoughts far away and heart heavy. Dawn was just starting to turn the sky a paler shade of black when Bucky heard Tony stirring.  As he turned around, he saw Tony reaching out for Bucky's side of the bed as if reassuring himself that he was still there.  When all he found was cold sheets, Tony rolled over and cracked an eyelid to find Bucky standing at the window. 

               “What’s wrong?” he murmured sleepily as Bucky came over to sit on the edge of the bed.

               It would have taken a stronger man than Bucky to resist running a hand through Tony's sleep-tousled hair, the only part of Tony's body that wasn't covered by the quilted blanket.  He was quiet for a long moment as he thought about what he should say.  “Hydra found me,” Bucky said finally, and Tony came awake immediately, sitting straight up.

               “Are you alright?” Tony tugged on the dressing gown to inspect Bucky for wounds then glanced around as if expecting a pile of dead bodies or pool of blood. "What happened?"

               “Nothing, I’m fine," Bucky said, gathering Tony's hands in his own. "I just…I need to tell you about Hydra.  About me.”

               “Sure,” Tony said after a moment.  He moved to sit back against the headboard and squeezed Bucky's hands reassuringly, eyes intent on Bucky's. “I’m listening.”

               Bucky took a deep breath and stared at their hands; he didn't know if he could say this while looking at Tony. "I think you know, by now, what I was to Hydra."  When Bucky glanced up at Tony with a question in his eyes, Tony nodded guiltily. During the dinner party, Tony had managed to bring up the topic of Hydra a couple of times when Bucky wasn't around; most people spoke of them like they were just a ghost story made up by the angry locals to scare foreigners into leaving.  Had Tony not witnessed the terrifying ease with which Bucky had dispatched the men of the Ten Rings, his ability to change his personality like another would change clothes, and his faculty for creeping in and around the Baron's home, he might have believed them.  Bucky nodded too, an echo of Tony's, and looked away again. "Once, on a mission, I spared a man's life. Hydra...found out.  When they caught me, I was drugged until I couldn’t tell reality from hallucination and thrown in a hole.  I still have no idea how long I was down there, but when they pulled me out, gave me food and a bed and a bath, I was so pathetically grateful that I didn’t dare disobey again.”  Bucky's voice didn't crack or waver, but it's flat monotone spoke volumes, sliding between Tony's ribs like a knife.

               "Bucky..." Tony made a wounded noise and pulled on Bucky's hands, trying to tug him closer.  Bucky shook his head and swallowed thickly, trying to pull away but Tony wouldn't let him, clinging to him stubbornly. 

               “The stories say that Hydra keeps control of its assassins by poisoning them and only delivering the antidote when they return from a successful mission," he continued. “That's only partially true.  It’s not a poison, it's a drug.  When you take it, it feels like...like you are flying, like you are invincible.  But if you don’t return for your regular dose, you get deathly ill.  No one gets far before they are too sick to move, and that's when Hydra comes for you.” Tony managed to make an encouraging noise for Bucky to continue, even though he was almost vibrating with a helpless rage on Bucky's behalf.  He realized that his hands had tightened on Bucky's, like he could protect him from these memories, and he forced his grip to relax.  “Last week, I returned from a mission feverish and shaking.  Hydra was afraid I had the plague, so they refused to come near me; the only person who would treat me is my friend Natalia.  The food and drink she was supposed to give me was laced with the drug, but using the cover of my illness, she threw their food out and gave me the clean food she smuggled in.”

               “So when you recovered, you were no longer under their control,” Tony finished for him. “That’s how you could escape this time.”

               “Yes.”  Tony waited for him to continue, but Bucky stayed silent, head bowed.

               “When you say Hydra found you-”

               “It was Natalia, delivering a warning.  She told me to get out of town because she's planning to destroy Hydra.”  Bucky took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "But I…after what she did for me, I don’t know if I can leave her behind.  I should stay and help her instead of fleeing like a coward, but..."  Bucky lifted his head and met Tony's eyes, and the fear in them made Tony's breath catch in his throat. “If I get caught again-”

               “That’s not going to happen,” Tony said fiercely.  He moved closer, all but climbing into Bucky's lap.  _Come with me,_ he wanted to beg.  _I'll keep you safe,_  he wanted to promise. But he didn't know if that was true; he had no idea what he was going to find when he returned home.  And Bucky deserved to make a new and happy life for himself, instead of following Tony being his babysitter. “Look, I-I didn’t tell you the whole story about my escape,” he said instead.  “While I was with the Ten Rings, there were other prisoners, but one in particular had become my friend.  He was a fellow scientist, a doctor.  He was very ill for the time that I knew him, he had caught consumption from one of the Ten Rings’ fighters.”  Bucky ran a thumb over Tony’s knuckles when his story stalled, a silent reminder that he wasn’t alone.  “But he was a doctor, too valuable to die, so the Ten Rings did everything they could to keep him alive even though he was ready to meet his creator. I…” Tony cleared his throat as his voice got thick.  “He stayed behind to trigger the cave in so I could escape.  He told me not to waste this chance at a new life.”  When Tony’s voice faltered, Bucky pulled him into a hug, holding him tight as Tony breathed raggedly.  It took a few minutes, but Tony wiped his face on the sleeve of his night gown and drew back so he could look Bucky in the eye.  “So what I’m saying is, I’m sure if Natalia cares about you, she wouldn’t want you to waste this chance to get out. To be free." Tony rested his forehead against Bucky's. “Maybe helping you is  _her_ one good thing.”

               Bucky closed his eyes against the truth in Tony's words. "Maybe you're right," he murmured, and his hands came up to cradle Tony's face as he pressed a kiss to his temple. Tony's hand circled Bucky's wrist, then he turn his head and their mouths met.

               Bucky's eyes flew open and he went still, surprised.  Tony blinked, as if he had surprised himself, then his gaze went to Bucky's mouth, eyes growing dark with heat and hunger.  "What are you-" Bucky started to say but was stopped by another kiss, Tony's tongue darting out to flick at Bucky's lower lip as he shifted against Bucky, moving to straddle his lap. At the feeling of Tony's body moving insistently against his own, Bucky got hard so fast he was a little dizzy with it. “Are you sure?” he panted against Tony’s lips, hands sliding down his hips, stopping just short of the swell of Tony's sweet, rounded bottom.

               “Please,” Tony said, knees tightening around Bucky's thighs.  “We don't have much time left.” His voice was low and pleading, his hands desperate as they tugged at the dressing gown on Bucky's shoulders, shoving it down his arms to find skin.  Bucky rolled them over, pinning Tony to the bed, and his low moan lit fires under Bucky’s skin.

               “Stay,” he ordered as he sat up, pressing a hand to Tony’s chest to make his meaning clear. He shrugged out of the dressing gown and threw it aside as he sat back on his heels between Tony's legs, eyeing Tony like a feast, the look on his face giving Tony goosebumps. He circled the fine bones of Tony's ankles then started slowly pushing up Tony’s long sleeping gown, pressing kisses and tiny bites to the skin that he was slowly revealing, memorizing every scar and freckle.

               “Bucky,” Tony complained, moving restlessly under his hands, wanting him to do  _more_ , move  _faster._  He tried to sit up to reach for him but Bucky pressed him back down to the bed.

               “Me first,” Bucky growled, and in the thin light of morning he saw Tony shiver and watched with satisfaction as a red flush spread across his skin.  “I have a birthmark to find.”

               Tony’s laugh at that was a breathless, but he stayed where Bucky put him.   Bucky settled back down and slid his hands up Tony’s legs, fingers skating over the sensitive skin behind Tony’s knees before he pushed the gown up to Tony’s waist.  “There you are,” he breathed, brushing his thumb over the small blemish in the shape of the Italian peninsula on the inside of Tony’s thigh.   He kissed it, then bit it, sucking what would soon be a small bruise there.  He absently noted that Tony had pulled the gown off the rest of the way and was laying back against the sheets, the early dawn rays gilding him in rosy pinks and gold, as pretty as a painting.  Bucky nosed higher, kissing and licking at the crease of Tony’s thigh and completely ignoring the hardness pressing against his cheek, though the desire to taste it was heavy on his tongue.  Tony’s muffled curses and urgent, aborted movements under his hands and mouth were making Bucky want to rush so he could hear the sweet noises Tony made when he came, but he took a deep breath and forced himself to go slow. 

               After scattering more love bites to Tony’s other thigh, determined to leave his mark on him before left, Bucky moved up to Tony’s stomach, dragging his cheek and throat against Tony’s cock.  “Bucky, please,” Tony pleaded, hips surging.

               “Shh,” Bucky said soothingly against Tony's belly button, lips and teeth traveling up the ladder of Tony’s ribs before licking over his nipple, teasing it to hardness before moving on to the other.  He was braced on his elbows, holding him just far enough over Tony that their bodies barely brushed.  Tony was trying to pull Bucky down as he thrust up, seeking more pressure against his hardness, but Bucky would only allow him a few seconds of satisfaction before pulling away again. 

               “I need you, Bucky,” Tony said, hands clumsy with arousal as they tried to push Bucky’s braes off his hips.  “I feel like I've been waiting so long-”

               Bucky captured the rest of Tony’s words with his mouth, swallowing Tony’s groan as he kicked his braes to the floor and finally, _finally,_ let his body rest against Tony’s.  Tony immediately wrapped a leg around Bucky’s thigh and his arms around Bucky’s back, setting his teeth into the meat of Bucky’s shoulder as he thrust against him, their cocks sliding against each other and growing slippery with the force of their desire.

               “Tony, wait-”  Bucky tried to get a grip on Tony’s hips, to slow down, but Tony bit his shoulder again and the sting of it was setting off sparks at the base of Bucky’s spine, making it difficult to keep a grasp on his self control. 

               “Next time,” Tony panted. “I’m sure the kitchen has olive oil, and then we can-”

               “Oh, God,” Bucky burst out, imagining it.  With oil he could split Tony open on his cock and slide deep inside, so deep that he would be with Tony forever and he could feel Tony fall apart around him.  Right now there was nothing in this world or the next that he wanted more than that, to have Tony crying out helplessly underneath him as he thrust inside or to have Tony riding him in this beautiful light of dawn, head thrown back and body arched with pleasure. “Oh God, Tony-” He captured Tony’s mouth for a clumsy kiss as they thrust together, all skill abandoned.  Bucky braced one arm on the bed and the other under Tony's hips, both of them setting a brutal pace as the raced for completion.

               Tony pulled away from the kiss to gasp for air, his panting breath a hot gust against Bucky’s chest as he pressed his face against his neck.  “Yes, yes, _yes,_ ” he chanted softly, each word a benediction. His hands clawed into Bucky's back as he got close, his grip desperate, and Bucky helplessly imagined that he would find bruises there later, marks to prove that for at least a short while he belonged to Tony and Tony belonged to him-

               There was another sting as Tony bit Bucky’s shoulder to muffle his cries, his cock spilling hot and wet between them. It took only a few thrusts for Bucky to finish as well, his orgasm stealing his breath after one choked off cry. He could feel Tony holding him tight as he shivered through the last surges of pleasure, fingers and toes tingling from the force of it.  Ignoring for now the cooling come on their skin, Bucky shifted so he could frame Tony’s face in his hands, kissing his eyelids and his temple before finding his mouth.  This kiss was long and slow and tasted of satisfaction, lips and tongue sliding leisurely against each other.  Eventually Bucky pulled back as Tony started to squirm underneath him, and after a second he realized what Tony was after.  He reached for his braes with his longer arms and cleaned up the mess between them, tossing them to the side before laying back down and tucking Tony against him, arm resting possessively on his waist.  He buried his nose in the soft hair at Tony’s nape and Tony huffed out a laugh.

               “Ooh, big scary Hydra assassin that loves to cuddle,” Tony teased, covering Bucky’s hand around his waist with his own.

               “Fear me,” Bucky agreed drowsily, every muscle in his body relaxed and sated with happiness.  “First sleep, then you can go get the olive oil.”

              

               The next thing they knew, they were woken up by the sound of a knock on the door and the voice of the footman calling out.  “Sir?” He said.  “A man from _The Fury_  is here, he says the ship will be leaving today on the afternoon tides if you still want passage to France.”

               Tony muttered a curse and cleared his throat, heart sinking even as Bucky's arm tightened around him. “Thank you, I will pack immediately,” he called back.  He didn't have to look at Bucky to know what he was thinking; the silence between them was cold and heavy. He gave himself a few more moments, trying to memorize the feel of Bucky against him before untangling himself reluctantly from Bucky’s embrace.  "Shit," he said under his breath, sitting up on the edge of the bed and burying his head in his hands.  _They were supposed to have more time,_ he thought helplessly, shivering in the cool morning air.  He gave himself a few minutes to feel sorry for himself before he forced himself to stand and get his belongings ready. He could feel Bucky’s eyes on him as he dressed, trying not to look over lest he lose the will to leave. 

               "This is good," Bucky said hesitantly, sounding like he was trying to convince himself of that and not just Tony.  "You'll only really be safe when you're away from here."  Tony nodded, throat tight as he packed his new clothes and everything he’d bought, putting Bucky's gifts near the top of his travel chest so they'd be within easy reach.  Then he heard the bed creak and the sound of sheets rustling.  Tony was starting to feel awkward and self-conscious about the night before until Bucky caught his hand and tugged him close to kiss his temple. “I am going with you to the docks,” Bucky said.  "Don't leave without me."  Then he slipped back into his own room to get dressed while Tony finished packing.  

               He was waiting for Tony in the hallway when he came out, dressed in his high society clothes with a bag over his shoulder.  The bag reminded Tony that this was Bucky's last day in town as well, and that after this, there would probably be no way for him to ever find Bucky again.  He knew that it was foolish to keep dragging this out, that they should part now instead of making it more difficult, but when Bucky pulled him into a hug he didn't have it in him to resist.

               “Are you ready?” Bucky murmured against Tony's temple, hands warm on his back even through his clothes.  Tony took a moment to lean into Bucky's embrace before he nodded and pulled away.  Bucky slipped out the back while Tony said his goodbyes to the Baron, then they followed _The Fury’_ s messenger to the docks, where the captain showed Tony to his berth.  Bucky stood guard on the docks while Tony got acquainted with his home for the next few weeks and stowed his things before getting out of the way for the sailors to finish making ready.

               “So where are you going to go now?” he asked Bucky as they watched the men crawl over the ship’s rigging.  Tony's gold was making Bucky's bag reassuringly heavy; he'd tried to offer more, but Bucky started protesting that he wouldn't be able to carry any more than what Tony's already paid him. 

               "I don't know." He had thought, briefly, of going back to Wallachia to find his family, but the possibility of that seemed slim since he had no idea where to even start looking.  Staying here was impossible; even though the sand and the unforgiving sun and the sounds of the call to prayer were as familiar to him as his own hands, Hydra would never let him rest.  “Somewhere new, I guess,” he said eventually.  “Where’s the farthest place I can go from here?”

               Tony frowned thoughtfully for a moment then pointed out across the water.  “Across the water is my homeland.  If you go north and a little west of there, there is an island off the coast, visible on a clear day.  If you go to that island, and continue north, beyond the mountains, I hear there are more islands, places with more sheep than people.  That could be...restful,” he said dubiously, then pointed back the way they had come, to the east.  “Or you could go that way and brave the Mongols.  It is said that their empire dwarfs the Roman or the Byzantine in size, plenty of room to get lost in.  South is a brutal desert unless you can get passage down the Nile, but beyond that, I hear there are many thriving kingdoms.  The farther north you go, the winters become long and harsh, but the people there are great warriors and would probably welcome you.”  Bucky stared out over the harbor and past the buildings that lined the coast as if he were looking for the wonders that Tony was describing, but instead of feeling full of possibilities, the world seemed impossibly large and lonely.

               “Or,” Tony said hesitantly, “you could come with me. The captain said there’s room for one more.”

               Bucky turned to look at Tony, who was watching him with cautious hope.  Inside Bucky’s chest, a knot of warmth appeared; it would take weeks to sail across the Mediterranean and who knows how long after that to reach Tony’s actual home.  Once there, Tony would have to become the Duke of Anjou once more, far above the hopes of someone like Bucky, but until then...until then, he could pretend Tony was his to keep, to treasure and protect. “Sure,” Bucky said.  “That sounds perfect.”


	8. Betrayed

               After six weeks at sea, with the wind in his hair and the flat, shimmering expanse of water around him, Bucky was not well pleased to be on the back of another God cursed horse.   The weeks on the ship had done good things for Tony; he’d finally lost the pallor he’d gained during his imprisonment, his skin bronzing and hair lightening from all the time he spent on deck during their voyage, his body filling back out to a healthy weight from the steady meals.  For the first few days he’d given Bucky regular panic attacks by fearlessly climbing the rigging and helping the sailors with their duties before Bucky got used to him clambering around like a monkey.  Bucky didn’t even question when or why Tony had learned how to sail, but he did sit down and teach Tony more knots than even the sailors knew.  Without the distraction of social obligations, Tony quickly mastered shatranj and at their first stop in Alexandria, bought a backgammon game to help wile away the long hours at sea. Once their ship landed safely at Marseilles Tony had purchased two horses over Bucky's protests, a matched pair of lively roans.  Bucky had taken one look at his prancing horse and forced Tony to trade it for the calmest, most plodding palfrey in the stable and then proceeded to complain about it constantly. Bucky's disgruntled mood was not helped by the fact that the closer they drew to Tony’s estate, the more Bucky’s stomach filled with dread, making every mile worse than the last even as Tony seemed to only grow more excited. 

               “I know it’s not the best time of year to visit because it’s just past harvest season; most of the leaves have fallen and all the grains are in from the field, but it’s still a beautiful estate,” Tony was saying, as if Bucky could spare an ounce of attention towards the landscape while he was concentrating on not being betrayed by his horse or grabbing Tony and riding in any other direction except for this one.  

               “So when are we going to reach your demesne?” Bucky asked, trying not to betray his reluctance to reach their destination.  An hour ago it had started raining, which Bucky thought was unnecessarily foreboding but at least it matched his mood.

               “We’ve been riding through it for the last few hours,” Tony said, turning in the saddle to frown at Bucky.  “Haven’t you been listening?”

               “ _Hours_?” Bucky repeated.  He finally looked up from the road to crane his head back at the forest that stretched behind them.  “All of this?  How many people live on your estate?”

               “When I left, it was 1,242,” Tony said. “More if you count the estates of people who owe me fealty.”

               Bucky whistled, impressed.  “That must have kept you busy.”

               Tony shrugged.  “I had good employees who helped me manage everything so I could be left largely to my hobbies.”  He stood up in the saddle to peer down the road.  “Huh.”

               “What?” Bucky craned his neck to see what Tony was looking at, trying to nudge his horse into going faster which it completely ignored.

               “The posting house is closed,” Tony said, pulling his horse to a stop in front of a building that was clearly abandoned and had been for at least a few weeks, judging from the overgrown grass and flowers surrounding it.   “Why would they do that?"

               Bucky's horse drew next to Tony's and stopped of its own accord, lipping at the overgrown grass. Other than the signs of abandonment, the building seemed perfectly fine, if ominously dark and damp in the dripping rain.  Bucky’s bad feeling was growing worse as the omens seemed to keep piling up, but he held his tongue.   If Bucky’s worries were true, they would find out soon enough. 

               Tony studied the building for a few more minutes, frowning in confusion, before he nudged his horse back to a walk.   The frown stayed as the forest gave way to an open field and an impressive manor house came into view. "Home sweet home," he said, shoulders relaxing minutely when he saw that the manor was still lived in, people scurrying to and fro despite the rain.

               “You weren’t kidding about the size of your tower,” Bucky commented, and that seemed to break Tony from his thoughts.

               “I thought you figured that out in Acre,” Tony answered back cheekily as they approached the stables.  “And many times on the ship.” 

               As with many fortified homes, the main stables for the manor were kept outside of the walls in case of fire, so Bucky and Tony left their horses there with instructions for the stable boy to make their horses comfortable while they went up to the keep. As they approached the front door, Tony seemed to have shed his earlier misgivings because his step was downright bouncy as he pulled back the heavy carved door knock and let it fall.

               “State your business,” a gruff voice said as a window in the door swung open.

               “I am Antoine Stark, Duke of Anjou! I’m home!”  Tony said with a triumphant grin.

               “Impossible.  Antoine Stark is dead,” the guard said flatly.

               Tony’s frown faded. “I’ve been gone for a while, sure, but not that long.  What is your name? I want to speak to Captain Rhodes.”

               “I don’t know any Captain Rhodes.”

               “What? Impossible.” Tony thought for a while and said to Bucky, “Maybe when I went missing he went looking for me.”  Turning back to the guard he said, “Find Lady Potts, the chatelaine, or Edwin Jarvis, the butler.  They will recognize me.”

               “No one by those names lives here.”

               “Well then by God who _does_ live here?”

               “Obediah Stane is the lord of the manor here.”

               “ _Lord?”_ Tony repeated in disbelief.  “Fine.  I would speak with Stane, then. He was my bailiff.” 

               “I will see if Lord Stane would speak to you.”  Then without so much as a goodbye the guard turned away.  After a moment, the door swung open and two other guards led them to a room deeper in the tower and instructed them to wait for Lord Stane.

               Tony started pacing and scowled.  “ _Lord_ Stane? What in the hell has been going on here while I was gone?”  

               Bucky was silent and let Tony pace and mutter to himself, getting an increasingly bad feeling the longer the guard was gone.   “Tony, I think we should go,” he said finally. Something was very wrong here.

               “Why? This is my home, I want to know what-”

               Just then the door opened and a large, imposing man with a gray beard and a bald head came through, dressed richly in red and gold.  His eyes were dark and beady against his pale skin and he was flanked by two guards. “Is this him?” he asked, eyeing Tony and Bucky with disdain.  “The man who claims to be Antoine Stark?”

               “Yes, sir, that one right there.”

               " _Claims_ to be Antoine Stark?" Tony scowled and started to take a step forward but Bucky grabbed his arm.  “Stane, what the hell are you playing at?”

               “I’ve never seen this man before in my life,” the man said, and turned away.  “Arrest them both.”

               “Yeah, that’s what I was afraid of.  Time to go.”  Bucky pulled a stunned Tony towards the large window on the outside wall.  “Go, go! Jump!”

               Tony let Bucky push him into the window but balked when he said jump. “What-“

               “No time,” he said and with a shove he pushed Tony out the window and into the murky water of the moat below, then followed him just as one of the guards was trying to grab his arm.   The water was shockingly cold and dark as Bucky fought for the surface, kicking against the reeds growing at the bottom.  When he reached the surface he brushed his wet hair away from his face and immediately heard the alarm sound in the keep.  “Come on,” he said, tugging on Tony’s arm as he started to protest.  They swam for the far side of the moat and climbed out, slipping on the mud and wet grass next to a flock of angry geese that hissed and honked at them as they fled the manor.

               Tony was suspiciously silent as they ran for the trees, wading through creeks and doubling back in case Stane had hunting hounds.  But they couldn’t run forever, so when Bucky thought that they had put enough distance between themselves and the manor he stopped and turned to Tony. “Oh, _habibi,_ ” he said when he saw the shocked, betrayed look in Tony’s eyes.  He pulled him into his arms. “I’m sorry.”

               “I was supposed to be home,” Tony said numbly into Bucky’s shoulder.  His hands came up and fisted in Bucky’s shirt as he buried his face against Bucky’s neck.  “We were supposed to be _safe._ ”

               “I know.  I know, I’m so sorry.”

               “I thought all of this was over, the running and hiding-”  Tony’s voice fractured and he fell silent.

               “I’d hoped so too,” Bucky murmured, pressing a kiss to Tony’s hair even though it was still wet and smelled like a pond.  “But you have to be strong for at least a little while longer.  Do you know someplace we can go? Someone who might still be loyal to you?”

               Tony sighed and went limp against Bucky’s body for a moment before he straightened and wiped his hand over his eyes.  “There is one more person we could look for that might help us.”

 

               As he followed Tony through the thick forest the landscape started to grow hillier and rockier, the trees thinning and giving way to prickly brush.  After a while Tony stopped, then honest to God _yodeled._

               “Tony, the point of this exercise was to _not_ draw attention to ourselves - ” Bucky started, and then he jumped three paces back and had a knife in his hand when a young man dropped out of apparently nowhere to land on a rocky outcropping next to them.

               “Your Grace!” The youth cried. “You’re alive!”     

               “Peter! Thank God! I was beginning to think that I wasn’t going to recognize _anyone_ here,” Tony said, pulling the young man into a hug as Bucky scowled and put the knife away.

               Peter hugged him back tightly before he let him go and took a step back.  “Everyone said you were dead and I just heard that there was some imposter trying to claim the estate.  But it’s really you!”

               “Yeah, it’s me. We were already down at the manor and ran into Stane.  Where are Lady Potts and Mr. Jarvis and Rhodey now?”

               “Turned off,” Peter said, looking distraught as Tony's shoulders slumped with disappointment.  “Along with anyone else who protested or asked any questions about why Stane was suddenly in charge. At least, Lady Potts and Mr. Jarvis were,” he added. "Captain Rhodes still hasn't returned from the Holy Land."

               "I see."  Tony ran a hand over his face tiredly. “I'm going to need you to start from the beginning and tell me what the hell happened while I was gone.”

               “Can we do it in a place where we will be safe?” Bucky put in.  He felt exposed and vulnerable here out in the open, even though the area seemed far from any sort of village or farm.

               "Who is this?" Peter said curiously, seeming way to trusting for Bucky's piece of mind. 

               "This is Bucky, he's my..." Tony looked over at Bucky at a sudden loss. Bucky stared at him for a moment as his stomach sank, then he looked away.

               "Bodyguard," Bucky finished, avoiding Tony's eyes. 

               "Right," Tony said after a second of hesitation, flashing Peter an insincere smile.  "He's my bodyguard.  Bucky, this is Peter, one of my students."

               “Bodyguard," Peter repeated with an approving nod. "That's a good idea.  Come on, follow me.”  Peter started clambering up the rocky hillside and as Tony followed him, Bucky shrugged and did the same.  “So not long after you left,” Peter said over his shoulder as he picked out a path around the brush and rocks, “Stane started to boss Lady Potts and Mr. Jarvis around, trying to act like you had given him instructions that they knew nothing about.” When Tony snorted, Peter said, “Yeah, that was their reaction.  But Stane had been around for so long they just put up with it so it was sort of like, really awkward around the manor for a long time as they fought but tried to pretend like everything was okay.”  Suddenly they came around the side of the big hill/tiny mountain they’d been climbing, and a valley spread before them, dotted with fluffy white sheep.   Peter kept going and led them to a small but cozy lean-to where he could have a fire and rest but still keep an eye on the sheep.  “Then out of the blue one day, Stane announced that he’d gotten a letter from you saying that you’d joined the Crusades.”

               “The Crusades?!” Tony all but screeched. “ _Me?”_

               “Yeah I thought it was weird at the time, most of us did.” Peter put a few handfuls of dried leaves and small sticks on the almost dead fire to get it going again.  “You always said that the Church was full of self-righteous, self-serving pricks and that if the hand of God was going to be found anywhere it would be in the knowledge of the natural world, not in so-called miracles,” he said, clearly repeating something that he’d memorized.  

               The whole time Peter was talking Tony was growing redder and redder.  “I, uh, did say that,” Tony said, clearing his throat and sneaking a look at Bucky as if he thought maybe Bucky hadn’t noticed by now that he was at best a blasphemer and at worst a heretic.

               “And everyone was suspicious because a messenger hadn’t been by for days, and everyone was asking why would you write Mr. Stane and not Lady Potts or Mr. Jarvis?  But _then,_ ” and at this point, Peter’s shoulders slumped a little because this was clearly a bad memory, “Captain Rhodes’ letter came.”

               “Saying that I was dead?”

               “No, _that_ one said that your caravan had been attacked and that you were missing and that he was staying in the Levant to find you.   It wasn’t until later that we got a letter saying that you were dead.”

               “A letter from Rhodey?”

               “No, that was another strange part,” Peter said with a frown.  “This one looked all official and said it was from the Templars.”

               “The Templars?” Tony repeated.  “Why would…” he trailed off, brows drawn together with confusion.

               “I snuck a glance at the letter, it certainly seemed official, with stamps and a signature and everything.  And it said just what Lord Stane said it did, that you had been found dead of a bandit attack.” 

               “Must have been forged,” Bucky said. “Stane probably had it made so he could use it to justify taking over the estate.  He also probably sent an envoy to try to claim your money as well.”

               “After that letter came things happened really quickly.  Suddenly Ms. Potts and Mr. Jarvis were gone, half of the guards at the castle were replaced, and if anyone mentioned your name they either vanished or were whipped.  I was moving the sheep from the low pastures up to the high ones at the time or I swear Your Grace, I would have tried to stop him,” Peter said.  “Everyone misses you like crazy, Sir. Mr. Stane… he’s a-”

               “Horse’s ass, I know,” Tony finished.  “I’m sorry, I never should have kept him on after my parents died.”

               “Calling him that’s an insult to horses,” Peter said fiercely, jabbing a stick into the fire, and even Bucky had to agree. “He’s lower than a snake’s belly.  But, uh, now that you’re here, what are you going to do?  You're going to get the estate back, right?”

               Tony blew out a long breath and stared out over the valley.  “That is a good damn question.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sprint to the finish! Last chapter posts tomorrow!


	9. Happily Ever After

            “I could kill him,” Bucky offered and Peter's eyes widened in alarm.

            “No,” Tony said with a sharp gesture. “No sneaking around in the dark. This is something that needs to be done for all the world to see.”

            “You should challenge him to a duel."

            “No,” Bucky automatically protested. Stane was taller and broader than Tony, with a longer reach. And even though Bucky had only seen him for a short minute, he could tell that the man was no pampered noble and was familiar with the business end of a sword.

            “Peter's right,” Tony said, setting his jaw.  Bucky got a bad feeling when he saw the martial look in Tony’s eye. “A duel is the fastest way to settle this publicly.”

            “Tony-” Bucky started, but Tony was shaking his head.

            “No, Bucky.  No more hiding. This is where I stop running. I am going to fight for what's mine,” he said with finality.  “But you don’t have to-

            “I hope you're not about to say what I think you are,” Bucky said.  “As your – your _bodyguard_ , I’m not leaving you.”

            There was a tense silence for a moment, where Peter was looking back and forth at both of them but they were studiously avoiding looking at each other.  Then Peter said, “I've got your armor, if you want it. I was afraid Stane would melt it down so I stole it.” He led them to another lean-to at the base of the trail and dug through the pile of hay inside, handing pieces of armor out to Tony and Bucky.  When he was finished, he agreed to go back to the manor and try to retrieve their horses and belongings, leaving Bucky and Tony alone in his small hut.

            “Let me guess, you forged this yourself?” Bucky said, running a finger down the shiny lacquered metal.  Even in the dim, overcast light of the day the armor glimmered like treasure, red and gold, but Bucky could tell that the iron underneath was sturdy and well forged.

            Tony nodded, looking at the armor critically, like he thought he could do a lot better than this but it would do.  “I think I am going to challenge him on Sunday,” Tony said.  “I want it to be as big a spectacle as possible, so that will give Peter time to spread the news.”

            “This is a hell of a gamble,” Bucky said. “If he wins…”

            “If he wins, I’ll live in the woods as a bandit and slowly steal all my money back,” Tony said with a grin, but Bucky wasn’t amused.

            “I mean, what if he kills you?”  He pressed.  “What will happen to this manor, to your people?” _To me?_

            Tony sighed and stared into the fire. “What would you have me do? Killing him in the night would start whispers and rumors that would follow me forever.  Going to the king and trying to press my claim there could take weeks, if not more, and the entire time Stane would be trying to have me killed.  And there’s no guarantee that he wouldn’t destroy everything out of spite if he loses.”

            Bucky stood and paced in frustration because Tony was right. As much as he wanted to fight this battle for Tony, this was something he was going to have to do by himself.  “I don’t like it,” he said finally.

            “But you don’t have a say in it, do you, _bodyguard?_ ” Tony said bitingly, his gaze flat and angry when it met Bucky’s.

            Bucky felt like he’d been slapped. “Tony…” he started, but he didn’t know what to say.  Surely Tony knew as well as Bucky did all of the reasons why they couldn’t be together, why there was no place in the _Duke of Anjou’s_ life for someone like Bucky, someone who didn’t have money that Tony hadn’t given him, who didn’t even have a last name. “I…”

            Tony was watching him expectantly, but when Bucky just floundered in silence he looked away. “Stay or leave, whatever you wish,” he said as he fed the fire. “But I’m fighting Stane on Sunday.”

            “I’m not going to leave you. Not until…until it’s over,” Bucky said quietly.  When Tony only nodded, still staring into the fire, Bucky went outside to stand guard rather than listen to the strained silence inside.

 

            The tension between them lingered as they waited for Sunday, and most of the time they spent together was occupied by training for the duel, Tony grimly but determinedly trying to hone his rusty sword fighting skills.  While they rested, they watched the sheep for Peter as he traveled from home to home and throughout the neighboring villages, spreading the news of Tony’s return and his intention to challenge Stane; each night was spent in a different shepherd’s hut, trying to stay ahead of Stane’s men. Tony’s anger seemed to have faded to a dull resignation as the days went on, and Bucky spent every night tossing and turning, sleepless from worry and misery.

            On the day of the duel, it seemed like every person on Tony’s estate and probably several from the surrounding ones were standing in front of the manor gate, waiting for Stane to respond to Tony’s challenge.  Tony was resplendent in his armor, glittering in the late fall sunlight, sitting on his roan with his sword strapped to his waist, looking every inch a Duke.  Bucky was at his knee, trying not to get stepped on as the roan tossed its head and pawed at the dirt in boredom.

            “He's going to play dirty,” Bucky warned.

            “With all these people watching?” Tony said, eyeing the gathered crowd. A noise went up as the doors started to open, and then Stane was riding out on his own horse, a huge gray that was at least two hands taller than Tony’s. Stane's armor was sturdy and well-made but lacked the ornate detail and color that drew the eye to Tony.

            “ _Especially_ with all these people watching,” Bucky said grimly, then stepped back to let Tony ride forward and challenge Stane. It might look like a fair contest to the average observer, but Bucky knew that four days of sword practice was hardly enough to make up for months of inactivity. The only reason why he was in reasonably athletic shape was from those weeks of climbing around the rigging on the sailboat.

            “Obadiah Stane, I name you a liar and a thief,” Tony called out, voice carrying easily across the hushed crowd.  “I am Antoine Eduard Stark, fourth Duke of Anjou, rightful lord of this estate and these people.  I challenge you in front of God and man and demand that you answer for your crimes. How do you answer?”

            “You are an imposter who is taking advantage of these peoples' grief and love for their former Duke to try to take something you have no right to,” Stane answered, voice booming. “Antoine Stark died in the sands of the Holy Land fighting for God, and that same God will judge you for your sins.”

            “We will see,” Tony said, face hardening as he closed the face mask on his helmet.  He dismounted and handed the reins to Peter, who led it away and urged the crowd to fall back.  After a moment, Stane dismounted as well and the two men drew their swords and shields and started circling each other as the crowd created an impromptu ring around them.  

            Stane struck first, a heavy blow than rang out loudly when Tony blocked it with his shield.  From the first swing, Bucky could see Stane’s strategy - he was going to use his greater weight and reach and try to bash Tony into submission.  Tony's biggest advantage was that he was faster and more agile, easily able to move out of the way of Stane's lumbering blows, but he was moving twice as much as Stane and would therefore tire that much faster.

            Stane swung again and this time Tony dodged, countering with a quick jab that slid off Stane’s armor with a teeth-aching screech. Stane spun and swung out with his shield, hitting Tony in the side and making him stagger.  They circled for a moment again, and as Tony moved closer to Bucky he shouted, “Get inside his guard,” hoping that Tony could hear him over the crowd.  There were a few more jabs as they tested each other’s guard, then Tony lunged, and when Stane dodged, he rammed him with his shoulder, locking up Stane’s sword arm with his shield and trying to hack at the gap between the plates at Stane’s thigh and knee.  Tony must have hit something because with a roar Stane pushed him away, sending him stumbling backwards.  Bucky winced and the crowd gasped as Tony tripped, but he rolled and came back on his feet before Stane could follow up.   Bucky could tell that Tony was a little rattled, but his experienced eye could see that Stane was slightly favoring his left leg, and he hoped Tony saw it too.  Now Stane was going to be motivated to finish the fight quickly, and Bucky prayed that Tony was ready.

            They traded a handful of blows, then Stane stepped in for an overhand swing, telegraphing it so clearly that it could only be a trap. “No!” Bucky shouted, but it was too late – Tony crouched and brought his shield up, bracing himself for impact, and Stane kneed him in the face.  Somehow Tony had the presence of mind to jab at Stane, a solid blow that dented his chest plate, and both men moved away from each other for a breather.

            Bucky paced back and forth at the edge of the ring of people, realizing that he had instinctively drawn his knife when Stane had attacked.  He put it away before anyone saw it and accused him of cheating, clenching his hands into fists against the temptation to leap to Tony’s defense. On the other side of the ring, he saw Tony’s sword fall slightly, leaving an opening, and as Stane took the bait, thrusting at his head, Tony dropped to his knees and bashed his sword against Stane’s already wounded knee.

            With a yell, Stane went down heavily as Tony scrambled away.  Tony probably could have finished the fight then and there, because Stane was wide open, but instead he lifted his faceplate and shouted for Stane to yield.  They were too far away for Bucky to hear Stane’s response, but the crowd shouted and cheered as Stane pushed himself back to his feet.

            After more circling, Tony tried again to hack at Stane’s weakened leg, but Stane was ready for him and punched him hard with the leading edge of his shield.  The whole crowd cried out when the blow landed, disfiguring the face of Tony’s helmet.  Tony staggered away and wrestled it off his head to toss it aside.  Bucky’s heart was in his throat when he saw the thin line of blood on Tony’s cheek, and if it hadn’t been for Peter grabbing his arm he probably would have run into the ring.

            “His Grace can do this!” Peter shouted in his ear.  “Have faith!”

            Bucky wanted to tell Peter in no uncertain terms what he thought about _having faith,_ but he couldn’t look away from Tony, his look of undaunted determination.  He was keeping his shield up higher, aware that Stane would likely go for his head, which without a helmet would almost certainly be a killing blow, but needing to shield his head also left his legs more vulnerable.   Bucky barely blinked as they two men circled each other, then his breath caught in his throat as Tony lunged, leading with his sword, and as Stane blocked with his shield, somehow Tony managed to trap Stane’s arm with his own.  Tony’s lip was curled into a snarl of effort as he put his weight into Stane’s trapped arm, bending it backwards and ignoring the blows Stane was raining down on his back.  Finally, the straps on Stane’s shield gave and it fell to the dirt, making both men stagger as they drew apart.  Stane kicked his shield out of the way so he wouldn’t trip on it, and the men circled again, each trying to figure out how to take advantage of the others’ weakness.

            “This man is going to be the death of me,” Bucky muttered, pacing again, running his hands through his hair with anxious frustration.

            “Bodyguard, huh?” Peter said skeptically, watching Bucky pace, and Bucky just scowled at him before turning back to the fight. Tony rapped his sword against his shield, the sound ringing out like a bell, and when Stane swung at him, he blocked it and countered it with a knee in Stane’s chest, sending him to the ground on his back.  He put a foot on Stane’s sword and called again for him to yield, but instead Stane rolled, forcing Tony to dodge or let Stane dislocate his knee.

            As Stane staggered to his feet, it was clear that both men were beginning to tire; it was taking Tony a fraction of a second too long to bring up his shield in response to Stane’s sword, and when Tony moved around the ring, Stane wasn’t chasing him like he had earlier.  The people in the crowd were yelling at them to end it, as if that wasn’t what they’d been trying to do this whole time.  Sweat was making Tony’s hair stick to his scalp, and Bucky was glad that they had trimmed it short for the fight.  For the briefest second, Tony and Bucky’s eyes met across the dueling circle, and when Tony turned back, Bucky saw a renewed resolve on his face. With an agility that no one would have expected from a man in full plate armor, Tony tried to sweep Stane’s weakened leg, making him stagger, then followed it up with a kick to the chest and solid blow to Stane’s neck. Stane stumbled backwards, struggling to stay on his feet, then Tony spun and swung with his shield, using his moment to backhand Stane in the head, catching him right on the temple.  Stane went down hard and the crowd went wild.  For a long moment, Tony stood over him, panting, but this time Stane stayed down.  When he saw that Stane wasn’t going to get up again, Tony sheathed his sword, and strode over to Bucky.

            “Marry me,” Tony said breathlessly.

            Bucky gaped. “What? I can't –“

            “You're devious, brilliant, devastatingly handsome and a better man than you let yourself believe.  I realized during this fight that don’t want to spend the rest of my life without you, and I have to hope that maybe you feel the same way.”

            Glancing around, he saw that everyone was staring at them, eyes wide, not wanting to miss a second of the drama. “Uh…but To- I mean, Your Grace –“

            “Don’t call me that, Bucky,” Tony said, voice raw.  “Never. Not you.  Tell me you don’t feel the same and I will never mention this again, but Tony Stark is standing before you, asking for your hand in marriage, not the Duke of Anjou.”

            “But-“

            “Okay, no, you’re right, I mean, we’re the same person, but you know what I’m trying to say.  So what is it?  Do I need to get down on one knee?”  Tony swept his scabbard out of the way and moved like he was going to try to kneel while wearing this great big pile of armor but Bucky stopped him.

            “Yes,” he said, a giant smile blooming on his face.  “It’s mad and I shouldn’t, but I think it’s clear by now that I can’t let you go.”

            As Tony leaned in for a kiss, the crowd cheered.  Bucky only had eyes for Tony, who was flushed and sweaty, incandescent with happiness, but instincts honed for decades heard a discordant note in the cheer, felt more than saw a surge of movement behind him.  He tried to shove Tony out of the way but he wasn’t fast enough; Stane’s knife found the gap in the armor plating at Tony’s side and thrust inside.

            Only to snap in half when it hit the chain mail under Tony’s plate.  As Stane stared at the broken dagger in his hand, Bucky tackled him with a growl, sending him sprawling into the dirt with a knife at his neck.

            “Bucky, don’t!” Tony shouted before Bucky could spill Stane’s blood on the torn up sod of the dueling ring.  “I’d rather him live with knowledge that he lost here today, even when he tried to cheat,” Tony said, voice hard. He bent down to pick up the broken blade and the hilt that had dropped from Stane’s hand.   The crowd was hushed as Tony went still, staring at the broken bits, and this time when his eyes met Bucky’s, they were cold and brittle with rage.  “On second thought,” he forced out, hands tightening on the shards of metal, “maybe he should be put down like the rabid dog that he is.”

            Stane must have seen the same thing in Tony’s eyes that Bucky did, because he raised his hands up and said, “I yield! I yield!” And then Bucky had to leap to his feet and stop Tony as Stane scuttled backwards.

            “It was him!” Tony yelled, trying to shove Bucky out of the way to get at Stane. “It was him the whole time!”

            “Tony, _stop!”_ Bucky yelled back. “He yielded! If you kill him now it would be murder!”

            “Bucky, it was _him,_ ” he said again as he stopped trying to get around Bucky. He turned to meet Bucky’s eyes and showed him the broken knife in his hand.  “I made this,” he snarled. “That man tried to kill me with a knife _I made_ in a slavery _he sold me into._ ”

            “I know, but-“

            “You _knew?”_ Tony repeated in disbelief, his rage momentarily diverted.

“No. No!” Bucky said, panicking at the look of betrayal on Tony’s face. “I didn’t _know._ It just seems obvious now, the attack was too convenient to be anything other than deliberate.  The Ten Rings were probably supposed to kill you, but they tried to ransom you instead, or blackmail Stane, or something, then you escaped.” Bucky put his hands on Tony’s shoulders, wishing there wasn’t metal and padding and God knows what else in the way.  “Look, you escaped, and now you won, and Stane will face justice for his crimes, okay? All of them.”

            “Oh, I will make _goddamn_ sure of that,” a deep voice said from behind Bucky.  Bucky turned to find a dark skinned man in padded leather armor standing over Stane, frowning down at the man as he stood with one foot on Stane’s wrist and his sword at Stane’s neck.  The crowd parted as a small squad of men joined him, surrounding Stane.

            “Rhodey!” Tony said with joy.  

            “Secure this man,” the newcomer said to the soldiers, then he sheathed his sword and turned to face Tony.  “Tony! Thank God,” the man said, pulling him into a long, fierce hug.  “I was afraid I’d never see you again.”  He pulled back but kept one arm around his shoulder, as if he wasn’t quite ready to let him go yet.  “Do you know I’ve been one step behind you since Acre?”

            “What? Really? How?”

            “That is a _very_ long story, and I want to hear yours first.  But who is this?” the man asked, looking at Bucky with interest.  “Let me guess, is this that Voivode I heard about in Acre that rescued you and was trying to woo you?”

            Tony laughed. “This is Iacobus, but you can call him Bucky,” he said.  Then he smiled softly, eyes shining, and Bucky’s heart flipped in his chest; he realized he was probably smiling at Tony just as foolishly.  “He’s my fiancé.”


End file.
